


the words

by devviepuu



Category: Once Upon a Time (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Alternate Universe - Coffee Shops & Cafés, Alternate Universe - Flower Shop, Canon Compliant, F/M, Idiots in Love, Language of Flowers, Long-Distance Relationship, Love and a Bit with a Dog, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Soulmates, Tattoos, Writer's Month 2020
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-03
Updated: 2020-09-01
Packaged: 2021-03-06 02:13:23
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 29
Words: 25,490
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25695589
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/devviepuu/pseuds/devviepuu
Summary: a collection of prompts from Writers Month 2020
Relationships: Captain Hook | Killian Jones/Emma Swan
Comments: 334
Kudos: 135
Collections: Writer's Month 2020





	1. prompt 1:  tattoo/flower AU

* * *

He ran his fingers over the curves of her breasts, over the delicate arch of her back, down her legs--and then he reminded himself that he was fondling a doodle on his arm in his empty bed.

Killian Jones sighed and stretched scrubbed his hand down his face as he pushed off the covers and swung his legs to the floor.

He should wash it off, but she had drawn it--drawn it with her markers as she straddled him in the chair and pulled his arm toward her with that look on her face, a mix of inspiration and mischief that rendered him speechless and helpless. He had real ones, of course, proper tattoos inked into his skin, and she had drawn those as well. And yet as he stood under the stream of hot water in the shower he made no move to scrub the drawing, holding his arm slightly away from the spray. Instead he traced it, running his finger up his arm and to his bicep--the ink she’d given him in New York, his brother’s name and rank and serial number in a rendering of his dog tags; there was the anchor along his pelvis, that was from Boston. The octopus curling around his shoulder and down the side of his torso--that was Los Angeles. She’d done the roped sailor’s knots around his wrist and the watercolor shamrock with its endless Celtic knot on his forearm in Orlando; his calf sported the red rose on the watercolor blue background she’d designed in New Orleans.

All along his body he had a map, the cartography of their relationship drawn and memorialized by her hand, its ups and its downs and its endurance across time and distance. He’d been to the end of the world during his Naval days and come back home, ensconcing himself in his small flower shop in his small hometown of Storybrooke, Maine. No sooner had he come home than she’d left, in demand at shows and conventions and at guest spots across the country and he’d followed her, for a day or a weekend or a week at a time, always eager for the excuse to have her hands upon his body. He would follow her to the end of the world all over again with the map that she had drawn for him with her ink and her hands and her fingers and her mouth and her kisses and he wished, sometimes, that he could tattoo those as well and mark them permanently across his body.

He turned the water cold in a futile attempt to calm the need that shot through him at the thought of her mouth on his body--on his skin, on his cock--before turning the water off. His expression in the mirror was flushed and hungry as he groped for his bathrobe and, finding the hook over the door empty, reached for a towel instead.

Killian stumbled downstairs five minutes later in sweatpants and a partially-buttoned shirt, sleeves pushed up to his elbows, running his fingers through his damp hair when he stopped in his tracks. On the wooden table in the kitchen was one of his arrangements, roses in purple and blue and orange and coral.

“Something smells delicious,” he said.

Emma Swan stood at the stove in his bathrobe and nothing else, her blonde hair cascading down her back, her smile brightening the room as she turned to grin at him over her shoulder. She had a spatula in her hand and a plate of pancakes on the counter.

“They’re just from a box,” she said, shivering as he came up behind her and swept her hair over one shoulder, exposing the dreamcatcher design at the base of her neck. She dropped the spatula as she spun around and kissed him and Killian barely had the presence of mind to reach around her and turn off the stove.

“I wasn’t talking about the pancakes,” he said, bending to kiss her; her hands ran up and down his arms and froze at the drawing she’d scribbled on him, pulling away and biting her lip.

“You didn’t wash it off,” she said.

“I never do,” he said. “How could I?” He lifted one of her hands from where it lay on his forearm and brought it to his lips, gently kissing her knuckles.

She inhaled and Killian paused.

“I think we need to talk,” she said.

“I find that when a woman says that, I’m rarely in for a pleasant conversation,” he said, dropping her hand, but the look in her eyes was pleading.

“How would you feel about another tattoo?” Her hand was on his chest, her fingers scratching at the patch of hair there, grabbing at the chain of the necklace he wore.

He sighed, both relieved and resigned. “And where are you off to now, then?”

“Storybrooke,” she said. “A small space is opening up on Main Street and it’s a great opportunity, Killian, with your shop and the renovations Ruby’s done at Granny’s--”

He moved to speak and one of her hands covered his lips; the other stayed where it was, resting just above his heart.

“I’ve been everywhere these past few years, and it never bothered me, not really. Storybrooke has always just been a place to me, except that you’re here and I realized that home is the place that when you’re away--you just miss it.”

Emma leaned her head against his chest.

“I’m tired of missing you, Killian,” she said. “You’re my home.”

In an instant he had her turned around and up against the counter and her hands cupped his cheeks--they were in his hair, her nails scraping across his scalp, her kisses covering the designs she had drawn for him, the map she had laid out on his person that led directly to his heart. Her legs wrapped around his waist as he lifted her against him.

“To hell with the pancakes,” he said.


	2. prompt two:  quarantine

* * *

It’s 3:56 in the morning on Tuesday when the phone rings.

“Hello?”

“It’s me.”

He doesn’t have to say it. Doesn’t have to say anything, really;  because she recognizes his breathing, the comforting rhythm of his inhalations and exhalations, from too many nights too many years ago for this to still feel expected.

“Who is this?” is what she says.

“Swan--”

“Do you have any idea what time it is?”

“You’re the one who left your ringer on.”

It’s on the tip of her tongue to lie. Her mother is elderly. Her sister-in-law is pregnant. Her brother works the night shift. All of these things are true but they are not the truth.

Because the truth is that it never occurred to her to turn the ringer off, not once in all of those years.

What if she missed his call?

“Why are you calling me?” is what she says.

“At four in the morning?”

“At all.”

“You know it’s only one here.”

“Yes,” she says. “I know how time zones work.”

She knows he knows; knows how he used to phone her at the most ridiculous hours, bored and drunk and tired and on one memorable occasion while being detained by a police officer. Three time zones are nothing when you’re twenty, twenty-one, twenty-two, but then that good job offer turns into a great career and adulting comes up on you pretty fast. Broke and budgeting and 3,000 miles apart and--it’s fine.

It’s fine.

“Why are you calling me?” She says it again, in a quieter voice. Gentler, softer, warmer.

Curious but not eager.

“I just--”

“Killian--”

“I just needed to hear your voice.”

Sometimes, when they were apart, he used to call her just to have the open phone line. So he could listen to her breathe.

“And now that you have?”

“Don’t hang up.”

“Four in the morning, Killian.”

“Do you have somewhere to be today?”

No. Not with the way things were--no. She had nowhere to be. 

No one did.

“Please, Swan,” he says. “Don’t hang up.”

And maybe this is what they call inevitable.

“Okay,” she says.

“Go to sleep, love.”

“Killian?”

“Yeah?”

“Just tonight,” she says, and she means it. “Don’t call me like this again. I couldn’t handle it.”

Emma Swan re-arranges her pillow, pulls her blanket up to her chin, and turns on her side to face the phone.

Okay. 

Maybe it’s not fine.


	3. prompt three:  magic

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> prompted by @RecoveringTheSatellites for missing moment in OUAT 3x18, 'bleeding through'

* * *

If he hadn’t been acting--the way he was acting--she might not have done it. But he was, and she did, and there was no taking it back, not the smirk or the jaunty flick of her wrist or her giggle or the way that what she really wanted, more than anything, was to provoke him. Because what he was missing was that spark.

So Emma Swan flicked her wrist and grinned her stupid grin and hung his hook from the light fixture in the deserted dining room at Granny’s and waited for a laugh that just didn’t come, for a spark that seemed somehow snuffed out, like he’d crushed it beneath his boots or maybe--she had?

She didn’t know and that made her want to act out, make him laugh or yell or _challenge her_ for fuck’s sake, up in her space and her grill with his _I’ve yet to see you fail_ or _Not a day will go by I won’t think of you_ or that stupid smile on his stupid face when she’d opened her door in New York and he’d seen her.

Instead, he sighed. It was a sound that contained no spark, no amusement, no anger, no raised eyebrow, no emotion. There was nothing but exhaustion and she had never seen him like this but it was too late for that, she could only grin stupidly at him and wait for him to recover the way he always did, the way he would cover it with a joke and a leer and then say something so breathtakingly supportive, so heartrendingly genuine, that it would make it all feel ok, somehow.

Because it wasn’t ok. There was nothing ok about this moment, this time, this place. Her son didn’t have any of his memories of his real life. Her parents were having another kid. Her life had been flip-turned upside down because Captain-freaking-Hook had shown up at her door and told her she had to save everyone again and worst of all, she’d followed him. She’d believed him when he sipped his rum and looked at her with his ridiculous eyes through his ridiculously long lashes and said, in that painfully genuine way that he had, “I came back to save you.”

Now he rolled his eyes and he looked at her and he said, “Bad form, Swan.”

They were under attack by the actual goddamn Wicked Witch of the West. She’d just left a fucking _seance_ and she could feel him behind her as she’d gone down the stairs--the ghost of his hand along her back but when she’d turned it was gone and he’d looked _wrong_.

He looked wrong now, too, the way the fingers on his right hand twitched and his left wrist was just--empty. He looked off-balance and like the thought of taking his eyes off of that stupid book for even a second was too much for her to ask.

It was only when he’d stood up and walked to the coatrack that it even occurred to her how much she had--well, she’d overstepped, hadn’t she? People called him ‘Hook’, his _more colorful moniker_ or whatever it was, but it was still--it was his. Emma didn’t even know how long it had been since he’d had two hands but just because she took it for granted didn’t mean that he did and--yeah.

She’d just wanted to have a laugh, just one minute to fool around with someone who--

Who _got_ her. Who did stupid things like cross realms and show up at her door and babysit her kid and who’d looked into her eyes and read her like a goddamned book with his “I love a challenge” and “I know how you feel” and that was the problem, wasn’t it? He did.

So she chuckled to cover it up and as she could hear the metal _click_ back into place and his muttered “I apologize for my rudeness” and the moment, it sort of hovered, hanging in the air for much, much more than a moment, as she looked at him and nodded and he tried to smile, a half-hearted thing--

“Emma! Emma!”

And then the moment was gone.


	4. prompt four:  long-distance relationship

* * *

It was mutual.  
First love wasn’t meant to last forever, they said.  
He had to leave. She had to stay.

“I’m working my way back to you, babe,” she said.

“Not a day will go by that I won’t think of you,” he promised.

It was only meant to be for a year.  
But all of these years later, they were still trapped 3191 miles apart.

\--

**Thursday**

_Killian Jones has sent you an image_   
[a bowl, a spoon, half a grapefruit; a french press full of coffee.]

The grapefruit makes her smile.   
“Staves off the scurvy, Swan,” he used to say as he handed her a cup of coffee.   
“Staves off my appetite,” she used to say.

**Friday**

****_Killian Jones has sent you an image_   
[a coffee mug on a pile of books: _The Count of Monte Cristo. The Martian Chronicles. The Tower Treasure._ ]

“How are you still reading the Hardy Boys? Did you steal this from a library?”  
“It’s called a used book sale, Swan. Don’t mock a man’s comfort reads.”

**Saturday**

_Killian Jones has sent you an image_   
[an empty paper cup with a tell-tale ring of coffee dregs; on the old trunk being used as a table, there is a small bowl of sea shells.]

Summer Saturday mornings meant Granny’s coffee to go and a walk on East End Beach. And Keats--always Keats. “Often ’tis in such gentle temper found, / That scarcely will the very smallest shell / Be moved for days from where it sometime fell, / When last the winds of heaven were unbound.”

She closes her eyes and can hear his voice.

It feels like a very long time ago.

(Emma wonders when she will be able to go to the beach again.)

**Sunday**

****_Killian Jones has sent you an image_   
[coffee. milk. sugar.] 

  
“You should really add some coffee to your sugar, love.”   
“Don’t mock a girl’s needs, Jones.”   
“How have you not rotted your teeth out?”   
“How would you even know? You don’t drink coffee!”

\--oh.   
_Oh._

\--

**Emma [9.04 AM]  
** Is this you trying to bring me coffee?

**Killian [9.07 AM]**   
Is it working?

**Emma [9.13 AM]  
** Ask me tomorrow.

\--

**Monday  
**

_Killian Jones has sent you an image_  
[two mugs. side-by-side.]

It’s early and the morning sunlight is warming the side of her face as Emma bites her lip. The mugs are strange and beautiful, hand-painted and mismatched on his wooden dining table.

(It’s even earlier there. That’s how time zones work.)

With a sigh, Emma holds up her own mug. It’s the one with bold lettering that says “Maybe today, Satan,” and--yeah.   
Maybe today.   
Her cat, Buttercup, takes it as an invitation and bumps her hand. The picture she sends back to him is a blur of cat and mug and coffee caught mid-spill. 

\--

**Emma [8.49 AM]**  
You owe me a refill, Jones.

**Killian [8.51 AM]**  
As you wish.

\--

The doorbell rings at 9:29 and it’s Ruby Lucas. She’s wearing a red beret that matches her lipstick that matches her nails and the red streaks in her hair. The mask dangling from her purse is red gingham. Safer-at-home be damned, Ruby Lucas is dressed to kill. 

Emma had gotten up this morning and put on clean sweatpants and a t-shirt she hadn’t slept in.

“How very on-brand of you,” Emma says through the partially-open door, and Ruby laughs. It’s full-throated and knowing as she leaves her offerings on the mat.

“It’s not the same as Granny’s,” Ruby says. 

“Granny would never do delivery,” Emma says.

“This was drive-through,” Ruby admits. “But it’s the thought that counts--and someone has clearly been thinking of you.”

“Good-bye, Ruby,” Emma says. Ruby mimes a “call me” gesture as the door slams shut.

The coffee is still hot.

The bear claw is delicious.

Emma looks at the phone. Picks it up, scrolls through to his number. 

Puts it down again.

Buttercup mews.

“Not you, too,” Emma says with a sigh.

\--

**Emma [10:02 AM]**  
Tomorrow. 9AM.

**Killian [10.03 AM]**  
See you then.

\--

**Tuesday  
** _Killian Jones would like to FaceTime_

Emma lets it ring. Just--she--her hair is up in a messy topknot and she’s wearing her glasses, for fuck’s sake, and she had known he would phone on time to the minute and why is she like this?

Why?

(Because she didn’t want to let herself hope, says a voice in her head that sounds annoyingly like her sister-in-law)

With a sigh she swipes and accepts the call, propping the phone up against the napkin holder. It’s not like he’s never seen her dressed like this, and--

“‘Ello, Swan,” he says.

Emma says nothing. She’s speechless, and it’s fucking awkward as hell; it’s just that she expected--no, she had no idea what she expected, but it’s not this, this calm, pleasant, familiar-but-not-creepy greeting over the rim of yet another one of his gorgeous coffee mugs and hers today has a line drawing of a cat making a face that just says “I do what I want” and that’s when Buttercup decides to introduce herself.

“Hi,” Emma says and hopes it isn’t muffled by the cat butt currently occupying most of the 7-inch screen.

“Hi,” he repeats. He smiles and takes another sip. “Who’s your friend?”

“Buttercup,” Emma groans, shoving all ten pounds of fur and cat off of the table.

“Honored to meet you, Buttercup,” he says, and nothing else.

He’s wearing a black hoodie and a red t-shirt and his hair is a mess and he hasn’t shaved but if Emma has ever had doubts that the years had been kind to Killian Jones--and she hasn’t, she’s seen pictures--they are immediately dispelled because his eyes still crinkle when he smiles, the way he is smiling right now, like he knows a secret, and--yeah.

Yeah.

She smiles, finally. She has nothing to say and it’s--it’s fine. It should be awkward and unpleasant--and it was, but only for like a second, now it’s neither of those things, and if part of her is itching to look more closely at the background of his kitchen, at the framed prints and kitchenware and the glimpse of a bookshelf hovering over his right shoulder, she suppresses it, ignores the evidence of the life he is living, the life he _has been_ living. Without her.

In this moment, here and now, it’s just them.

It’s fine.

Killian sips his tea. Emma sips her coffee.  
Finally she says, “It’s really nice to see you, Killian. You look--”  
He smirks. “I know.”  
“--like you haven’t slept in days,” she says with a grin.  
He laughs. “It’s only 6 here.”  
“Yeah,” she says, “I know how time zones work.” 


	5. prompt five:  soulmates

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> (Switch Soulmate AU! Where you switch bodies with your future self in a time when future you has already met their soulmate.)
> 
> (canon compliant 2x05, “the doctor” / 5x13, “labor of love)

* * *

It hits him in the aftermath, in the carnage, that this is a truly terrible plan.

The part of Killian Jones, Captain Hook, that used to care about such things grieves the unnecessary destruction, the brutal loss of life; the part of him that still grieves for _her_ reminds himself that this is another step toward his vengeance and those ends justify any means.

(He tells himself that he is too far gone to care, that he had his chance to change and lost it. It is a lie that he repeats to himself like a cantrip to keep him on his path.)

Cora is, as ever, unfazed by the havoc she has wreaked and the lives that she has taken. She too believes that the ends she seeks justify any means and in this they have a simple shared goal: get to Storybrooke. Find Regina.

(Find the crocodile.)

(Kill him. Avenge _her_.)

The sparkly dirt is questionable--not unlike this plan--but he does not question it. He’s learned that questioning Cora is rarely worth the bother and, frankly, he does not care what the answers are.

She gets what she wants.

So does he.

Nothing else matters.

(Any means necessary.)

He layers on his disguise with the ease of several months’ habit, wrapping the cloth over his typical garb and tucking his hook into his satchel as he contemplates the pit. It’s not just that it looks like a grave, but that it is one, though that only causes him to hesitate for a second before he lowers himself in and braces for the smell and then--

There’s fire, but it burns without heat, scorching his skin and freezing it at the same time. He can feel it cracking and peeling and he pants heavily, but he is not breathing. He is nothing but pain, agony and regret that burns through him as thoroughly as does the flame.

Shame.

He is ashamed.

Ashamed and lost and alone with the shadows on the wall, shadows that dance and coalesce and resolve themselves into a vision of an angel and inside of him there is a burst of light, of _hope_ , that is unlike anything he has experienced in his centuries of life and the only thing more surprising than that is the flicker of _anger_ that rushes through him, as white-hot as the fire should be.

“Killian,” she says, and he can feel it, the syllables of his name on her tongue.

(When is the last time someone referred to him by his name? He can’t remember.)

(She’s somehow beautiful even in the unfamiliar costume she wears, her face streaked with tears and her voice nearly breaking. Her eyes glitter green in the strange red daylight; her hair is long and golden and he would almost swear he knows what it feels like against his fingers, what it feels like to comb through that hair as she kisses him and calls him by his name.)

(She loves him.)

(She _loves_ him, and he knows that is why she is here in spite of all that he has done and broken between them and--)

“Killian, we’re here to help you,” she says. “Where are you?”

(He loves her.)

(He _loves_ her, in spite of all that she has done and broken between them.)

How?

_How?_

“Just tell us where you are,” she says, begging. “Talk to us. Talk to _me._ ”

He can’t. He _won’t_. This woman--whoever she is--is not Milah.

(This must be hell.)

(He always knew this would be his end, but in devising this particular torment, the gods have truly been unkind.)

The woman who is not Milah reaches for him and he reaches back, intending to blot out the vision, and then--

There is a hand pulling at him, dragging him back into the fresh air, into the bright blue daylight, from beneath the pile of putrefying flesh.

“He’s alive,” he hears someone say, a woman with long red hair and a childlike expression of pity.

“It’s okay,” says another, a petite brunette with a quiver slung across her back.

“Please help me,” he says, blinking, turning to meet the eyes of his rescuer and seeing glittering green eyes blinking back at him, narrowed in suspicion.

“You’re safe now,” the brunette says. “We won’t hurt you.”

The blonde-haired green-eyed woman says nothing. She says nothing as they lead him away, as they settle him at a table; she waits for him to speak as she hands him a cup and watches him drink.

“Fortune, it seems, has seen fit to show me favor,” he says; when she holds a knife to his neck there is a thrill of exhilaration, of _attraction_ , that runs through him at her audacity.

“You’ve bested me,” he says, and he laughs because somehow, he is not surprised; what surprises him is how easily he reveals to her his name, his given name.

“I was hoping it would be you,” he says, and he means it.

“You need me alive,” he says, and he knows that is true.

(He just has no idea how much.)


	6. prompt six:  ocean

**Friday**

Emma’s never seen the Pacific Ocean and Killian finds this unbelievable.

“Surely you’re kidding, Swan,” he says, hunching over his table to lean closer to the phone screen.

Emma shrugs. It’s an ocean, right? She has one, too, it just that she can see the sunrise instead of the sunset.

“That presupposes you’ve gotten up in time for the sunrise, love,” Killian says, and Emma surprises herself by laughing, because it’s true.

It’s also something that he knows better than--almost anyone, really, and he says it so easily and simply and in way that is strangely comforting, like it’s just a fact. That he knows.

Better than almost anyone.

“I guess you can, like, see the ocean from your window or whatever,” Emma says with a smile.

Killian’s eyebrow goes up in a way that _she_ knows. Better than almost anyone.

His hand brushes over the screen and suddenly she is looking out of his window at a view that definitely does not include an ocean.

“There’s water!” Emma says, protesting.

“That’s the _river_ ,” Killian says. “Have you never looked at a map? The ocean’s more than an hour’s drive even now that there’s no traffic or tourists.”

“I just always assumed--” Emma says, and then stops. The phone camera flips around again and she’s looking at him and his eyes and his eyebrow that is definitely not raised, his expression open and playful. “I just always assumed that you’d live by the water.”

God, she loves the way the corners of his eyes crinkle when he smiles and he looks at her like that; like he could look at her every minute of every day and never be tired of it, some mixture of surprise and awe coloring his features.

“It’s almost like you know me,” he says.

And she shouldn’t, just--this moment is so pure and so perfect but she can’t help herself as she feels her smile fade because she _doesn’t_ , not really, not anymore. They’re strangers now, with so many years and so many miles between them. The sun rises over her ocean and sets over his. It’s a metaphor, she thinks, and not a good one.

He senses her shift in mood like he always does but lets her go when she makes her excuse to get off the call; when she disconnects Buttercup comes up against her, a gentle rub of her head against the hand that still holds the phone as Emma sighs, feeling herself deflate.

This is _ridiculous_.

She can’t do this.

They knew each other when they were kids, when they’d had dreams and aspirations and people they’d wanted to be. That’s why they’d split up, for fuck’s sake--dreams and aspirations and things like _career opportunities_ and money and a desire to let go, to move on, to grow up. It’s just that neither of them had counted on growing _apart._

Emma wonders if he will be disappointed in who she is now, in the ways that she’s changed from that kid she used to be.

She wonders if she will be disappointed in him.

\--

**Killian [11.32 PM]  
** Is it alright if I phone you? Right now?

\--

She’s curled up in bed with Buttercup as she considers the text.

She doesn’t want to answer it, she decides.

Except.

What if it’s something bad? He promised he wouldn’t call her like this anymore. He always keeps his promises and--

\--

 **Killian [11.38 PM]  
** It’s nothing bad. I promise.

\--

It makes her smile even as she huffs a long sigh of displeasure.

This is exactly the kind of shit she needs to avoid.

\--

**Killian [11.41 PM]  
** This is avoidance, Swan. Please answer me.

\--

Buttercup looks up at her and mews.

“Still?” Emma says.

Buttercup blinks slowly.

“Fine then,” Emma says.

\--

**Emma [11.46 PM]  
** Ok

\--

_Killian Jones would like to FaceTime_ and when she swipes to accept she doesn’t see his face. Instead, she’s watching a sunset.

Over the Pacific Ocean.

He’d driven over an hour to show her the ocean. _His_ ocean.

“‘O ye! who have your eyeballs vexed and tired, / Feast them upon the wideness of the Sea’,” he quotes softly, the words blending into the crashing of the waves along the empty shoreline.

It’s at least a minute before she can say anything and she just blurts out the first thing that occurs to her, which is “Are you even allowed to be at the beach right now?”

She sees the phone move, as if he is shrugging.

“It’s not like we have a curfew or anything,” he says. “It’s just as you see, Swan. Quiet and empty. It’s just us.”

He’s barely finished speaking before a black dog comes lumbering up into the frame, going straight for Killian with the kind of delighted adoration that only a dog can convey.

“Who’s your friend?” Emma says. “Or--is he yours? I didn’t know you had a dog.”

The camera flips around and she can see his face. It’s unfair the way his eyes still seem to twinkle in the vanishing sunlight.

“You never asked,” he says. “He’s mine. His name is--”

“Westley,” Emma says, because she _knows_.

“I’m scared, too, Emma,” he says. “I’m worried I’m going to disappoint you. For instance, did you know that I almost got married?”

“Wait, what?” Emma fumbles the phone as she sits up in her bed. “What happened?”

“She went back to her husband,” Killian says.

Emma is silent. There is literally nothing to say to that.

Or maybe there’s too much.

“See?” Killian’s eyebrow is up. “I never want to let you down, Emma. But it’s going to happen. That’s life.”

Emma takes a deep breath and makes a decision. Maybe it’s the decision she should have made all of those years ago, but she’s not that kid anymore. Neither of them are.

“You can tell me on your own time,” she says, and is rewarded with the reappearance of his smile, her favorite one, the one with the surprise and the joy and the awe. “Whatever you did--whatever _I_ did, I don’t want it to change anything between us right now. I’m going to choose to see the best in you.”

The sun has set fully, his face a mixture of blue and purple shadows.

But his smile--it still shines.

“And I in you,” he says.


	7. prompt seven:  hurt/comfort

It gets the worst at night.

Where Emma could not sleep in the Underworld, Killian finds that he cannot sleep now that he has returned to the world Above. It’s not just that sometimes he can hear the whispers of the Darkness or the way that when the moon is full and bright he can feel it, pulling at his soul. It’s not the way he avoids the park after dusk because if he squints he can see the ferryman and wonders if the Underworld is attempting to pull him back down and reassert its claim.

It’s the way that being dead felt like it was a dream.

And if he falls asleep again--what if this time he cannot wake up?

(What if this time, she doesn’t come for him?)

When he tosses and turns, sweaty and confused and tangled in the sheets of their bed-- _their bed_ , and who would have ever guessed he could say such a thing--she reaches for him, the soothing balm of her magic already lighting her hand and he _flinches_ because he’s angry. He’s angry and _scared_ and it’s the Darkness rising up within him, the Darkness that already existed, that always existed, that now feels closer to the surface than ever before. She backs away, hurt and scared but, like him, _angry_.

Because she has it, too--and she is ready for a fight. 

Still. Always.

He gets up, gets dressed, pulling on his jacket and his boots and closing the door behind him. The door to his house.

Their house.

He nearly runs down the stairs in his eagerness to get away, to put some distance between the bed that they share and the ugliness that rises up inside of him. 

He walks.

He walks to Granny’s, where she has started leaving him a pot of tea in a container that stays warm. It’s herbal and soothing and slides down his throat when he mixes it with the contents of his flask. He walks to Snow and David’s, where they leave the light on over their front porch for him and let him sit in silence.

Sometimes David comes to sit with him.

Sometimes Snow does, and then she kisses his cheek and tells him to “go home, Killian,” and she doesn’t mean the house.

He avoids the park when he leaves.

He pauses before he unlocks the gate but only for a second; he walks up the stairs, slowly, and opens the door.

She waits for him as though he’d never left, in her sleeping shirt--in _their_ bed--and watches him undress, watches him pull off his boots and drape his jacket on the chair. She waits for him to lower himself back into their bed and she wraps her arms around him as lays his head in her lap. He wants to lick her, to taste her taste and smell her scent and feel the way she moves underneath him. He should be on his knees showing her how grateful he is that she came for him, that she loves him, that she _chose him_.

He doesn’t, he isn’t, but her fingers are in his hair, gently threading through; her other hand is on his chest and he can feel her as their breathing starts to match, as his heartbeat starts to slow. 

Sometimes it is not until he feels her palm against his chest that he remembers his heart is still beating.

He closes his eyes and sees not the red hellfire of the Underworld but a cool, inky blackness where sparks dance at the edges from her touch and her magic and he knows that this, more than any test administered by an angry god, is True Love.


	8. prompt eight:  eight

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> (soulmate AU where the day you and your soulmate should meet happens over and over again till you meet properly.)
> 
> (3B, canon compliant-ish 3x12, “new york city serenade”)

He’s forgotten when, exactly, Tinkerbell had told him.

At least a hundred years ago.

Possibly closer to two hundred.

He was definitely drunk at the time, in a haze of too much rum and not enough sleep as he attempted to drown out the cries of the Lost as she spouted off all of the manifestations of True Love she’d seen in the days before she’d lost her wings.

When Killian Jones knocks on the door to Emma Swan’s apartment, he is still wearing his greatcoat. He’s wearing his greatcoat, his boots, his leather trousers, his waistcoat; he’s left off the sword, because this realm apparently does not take kindly to them (his first attempt and the time he’d been arrested), and his hook, because he does not want to attract undue attention (attempt four).

Procurement of more modern attire was a waste of time and gold. He’d learned that on his fifth attempt.

This is his eighth.

It was fortunate, Killian reflects, that they’d been compatible in so many _other_ ways, for Tink did love to natter on; and he hadn’t believed in True Love, not then. Not since Milah had been taken from him, not until his whispered confession into the Echo Cave had he felt even the smallest spark of--

At any rate, there had been one story in particular, a tale of magic and destiny that caused the lovers to be locked into a time loop, repeating the appointed day of their meeting over and over again until they met properly and seven times, now eight, he has thrown the bean and walked through the portal into this realm with its bustling noises and speeding vessels and tall buildings with a single-minded focus on _Emma_ and found himself trapped.

It occurs to Killian now that perhaps the very improbability of their first meeting--the sheer and utter impossibility of it--the way they had sparked immediately and how it had set him on his path--has been undone by the fact that they are once again strangers to each other.

She had slammed the door in his face without a word on his third try.

Henry had answered the door on his sixth, pitting him against an angry Emma Swan pointing her gun in his face--an Emma Swan who did not appreciate his laugh and who did not remember that they seemed destined to meet like this, with her pointing a weapon at him and accusing him of lying.

Destiny is a funny thing to think about, but as Killian stands in front of her door and and waits for her to answer it, waits to see what today has in store for him, he finds he can think of nothing else.

This is magic.

Killian is not actually sure if he’s slept at all in the past seven days. All he knows is that each time he settles himself to try, he wakes and finds himself grasping a magic bean in his hand, throwing it and thinking of Emma, the way she had smiled at him before she’d driven over the town line, the way she had smiled and whispered to him, her voice full of meaning. Remembering the way she had looked at him and _seen_ him.

He knocks again and this time he hears music, he hears silence and then footsteps and the door opens and there she is--Emma Swan.

He can’t help it.

He can feel the smile on his face, stretching so widely that it hurts. He looks at her and it’s like there’s no breath in his body, just for a second. The sun is behind her and the way hit hits her hair even as she is glaring at him--an expression he knows so well--is breathtaking.

“Swan,” he says. He steps forward almost involuntarily, but knows that he has to act quickly before she does something like--

“Whoa,” Emma says, holding her hand out in front of herself. “Do I know you?”

“I need your help,” he says, speaking quickly. “Something’s happened. Something terrible. Your family--”

It’s the wrong thing to say.

“No,” she says, and Killian finds himself grateful that she does not have her gun. “My family is right here. Who are you?”

How does he even begin to answer that question?

“An old friend,” he says. He deliberately summons the image of her in his mind, the one that gave him strength in these last months as he says, “I know you can’t remember, but--”

He takes another step closer and he _hopes_ as he invades her space, pushes himself up against her the way she had done to him in Neverland and there is a second, just as their lips touch, when he feels-- _something_.

And then there is pain, her knee in his groin. It’s nothing to the rush of complete disappointment that flows through him. “I had to try,” he says. “I was hoping that you felt as I did.”

Why else would he be living this farce for the eighth straight day?

“You’re going to feel my handcuffs when I call the cops,” Emma says, and shuts the door in his face.

\--

“I can explain,” he says as he slides into the recently-vacated seat at her table. It’s on the tip of his tongue to blurt out every stupid, hopeful thing he’s thought over the past year, about how she might be the only person to _know_ him--and not just in the past year but in the entirety of his life. How she had looked at him on the day of their parting and _seen_ him.

“Just hear me out,” he says, willing her to look into his eyes and see that he is telling the truth. “I don’t do this very often, so treasure it, love. I’ve come to apologize.”

“You’re a crazy person,” she says, and there is a spark of something he recognizes: a _challenge_. “Or a liar. Or both.”

Killian smiles. “I prefer ‘dashing rapscallion’,” he says. She frowns and he raises his eyebrow. “‘Scoundrel’?”

 _Have you ever been in love_? He’d asked her, because he loves to push, he loves to provoke. There had been murder in her eyes--then and now--and something about this woman gives him a death wish.

“Give me one good reason not to punch you in the face,” she says.

He wants to tell her, how he had looked at her on the beanstalk and seen _her_ , Emma Swan, without even meaning to. He’d been taunting her, pushing her, riling her up--he did love a challenge--and instead, he had recognized a piece of himself in her.

“Try using your superpower,” he urges her, and that gets her. Emma’s eyes widen in disbelief as he sees it in her eyes--the first crack in her wall.

He loves a challenge and Emma Swan needs answers to the things she can’t explain and he knows she can feel it between them, something inexplicable.

“Just because you believe in something doesn’t make it real,” she protests.

“Maybe not,” he says. “But I know you, Swan.”

\--

And somehow, he is not surprised in the least that he wakes up the next morning on the couch of Neal Cassidy’s abandoned apartment--not even surprised that she has left him to the mercies of this realm’s constabulary.

Because--yet again--he awakens on a new day, and she comes back for him, this time; she drinks the potion and her face shifts and he can _see_ it, the moment she remembers.

_Perhaps there is a man you love in the life you’ve lost._

“Hook?”

He smiles. “Did you miss me?”


	9. prompt nine:  illness

Emma knew that Mary Margaret had a recipe _somewhere_. It didn’t matter if she was Mary Margaret Blanchard or Snow-freaking-White, the woman was going to make chicken soup when someone was sick, and she’d made it for Emma once in their roommate days.

It was, unsurprisingly, delicious. Wholesome. Full of healthy stuff that Emma didn’t usually eat because it didn’t go with grilled cheese, the kind of healthy stuff that a person who was sick with a cold needed. She was going to find the recipe and she was going to make it and--

“Emma?” her mother’s voice drifted out from the kitchen into the alcove. “What are you doing?”

“Killian’s sick,” she said, “which, by the way, is not a thing I knew could happen to him. I’ve never seen him sick, have you? And you know he’s going to be all--”

Emma shrugged, even though Mary Margaret couldn’t see her.

“Anyway,” she continued. “I just thought I’d, I don’t know--”

“Take care of him?” Mary Margaret had appeared at Emma’s side with one of her beatific smiles, the ones she got whenever Emma did something grown-up or normal or affectionate. Emma felt like she got more of those smiles for doing things like showing up for family dinner (and calling it that) than for saving the goddamn world. “You’re looking for the chicken soup recipe?” 

“Yeah--”

“Say no more.” Mary Margaret was a whirlwind of maternal efficiency who looked like she might actually burst in pride. In ten minutes there was a pot on the stove with simmering stock and Emma was being instructed in vegetable cutting, because apparently there was a right way to cut vegetables, who knew?

Mary Margaret did, obviously. And there was definitely something nice, Emma decided, about sitting in the kitchen with her mom cooking for her sick boyfriend. It was so--normal.

Not the way Killian had gotten sick--the combination of the ice wall and the heart-stealing finally catching up with him--but she was _in the kitchen_. With _her mom_.

It was nice.

Until--

“Um, Emma,” Mary Margaret said as she poured the soup into Tupperware for Emma to carry. “Are you moving out or something?”

Emma adjusted the shopping bag she had balanced on her forearm. “What? Why?”

“That’s more stuff than you brought to Neverland, for starters,” Mary Margaret said. “Also, it’s going to take more than a shopping bag to camouflage this--” she held up the Tupperware “--from Granny.”

“I don’t know,” Emma said, exasperated. “It’s _Killian_ , has he ever even _been_ sick? So I just went over to Doc’s and got him a bunch of stuff. I figured the chicken soup would help me persuade him to take it. He’s not exactly a twenty-first century man when it comes to modern medicine, you know?”

“O-kay,” Mary Margaret said, drawing out the word in a way that Emma did not like. “But you know--”

“Just give me the soup? Please?” Emma focused on the Tupperware and _poof_ ed the soup into her empty hand.

\--

Granny totally knew and gave her the evil eye but, fortunately, left her crossbow in the closet when Emma dared to cross the threshold of the B&B with food cooked by someone else. She actually sort of smiled and then _winked_ as Emma headed for the stairs to their--to _his_ \--room.

So, she stayed here sometimes. (A lot.) She was a _grownup_ with a _grownup_ boyfriend and they had adult sleepovers.

No need to publish it in the _Storybrooke Mirror_ or anything and definitely no reason for Granny to look at her _like that_ and Emma banished the thought that crept in at the edges of her mind about a wolf’s sense of hearing because--

Nope.

Banished.

She was pushing the door open when it was pulled out from under her, Killian standing there with a smirk on his face and his eyebrow up, dressed in his jeans and one of his button-down shirts which was, of course, _not_ buttoned.

“Swan!” He grinned. “To what do I owe the pleasure?”

“What are you doing up?” she said, pushing the rest of the way into the room and going to put the bag and the soup on the table and--

“What’s that?”

“Willowbark,” he said. “I believe in this realm you call it ‘aspirin’.” He bent over to check the bottle and gave a small sniffle as he stood up. “Aye, ‘aspirin’.”

“Aspirin,” she repeated, pulling a bottle out of her bag.

“For my fever, love.”

“I know what aspirin is for,” Emma said, feeling suddenly off-kilter. “How did _you_ know?”

“Willowbark has been used for pain and fever for centuries,” Killian said, surprised. 

“And you--” Emma gestured “--you just had aspirin in the Enchanted Forest?”

“We had _willowbark_ in the Enchanted Forest, aye. And poppies, as you know, for laudanum, and--” he stopped. “Swan?”

He looked like he was trying not to laugh and Emma blushed, turning away to put the soup down.

“Is that for me, too?” His voice was gentle now. “Does that also have medicinal properties?” He took it from her hands and opened the lid. “Ah, I see it is gelatinous. You are fond of that in this realm, aren’t you--”

Emma was still blushing, biting her lip; his hook pulled at her waist, tugging her closer to him. 

“Swan,” he said, letting her go and holding up his left wrist and his hook. “Did you honestly think I lived through this on rum alone? I had no idea I was so indestructible in your eyes, love. I find I quite like it.”

He was close, now, his nose against her cheek. “Especially when you’ve so often seen me at my weakest.”

“Shut up,” Emma said, closing her eyes and leaning into him. “You’re a survivor. You’re one of the strongest people I know. I just wanted--”

He pulled away just far enough to see her expression. “You just wanted?” “I just wanted to take care of _you_ for once,” she said.

“I’m quite amenable to that,” he said, “but have you given any thought to my level of contagion? Perhaps you’re the one that will need taking care of--”

She kissed him then, because it didn’t matter--just like the knowing look Granny gave her when she left (those fucking thirty-year-old squeaky bedsprings again) didn’t matter.

They could take care of each other. Mary Margaret would be happy to teach him how to make chicken soup.

(She was.)


	10. prompt ten:  bunnies

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> (this is a continuation of prompts two, four and six)

When they have their first fight, it comes out of nowhere.

They’re talking about a _rabbit_ , for crying out loud.

Its name is Leo and it belongs to Emma’s brother David and her sister-in-law Mary Margaret because of course Mary Margaret is the type to take the class rabbit home during the school shutdowns. She’s got a _thing_ for animals and they love her right back and it’s cute.

Really, it is.

Except now Emma’s stuck with the damn thing for a few days and Buttercup is not pleased with this development. She’s laughing about it, describing the Wild Kingdom antics in her apartment to Killian like it’s easy (it _is_ easy) because this is a thing they do now--they talk about their days, they check in. 

A lot.

It’s nice.

They avoid all of the stuff that’s painful, that has fangs.

The stuff that left scars.

She tells him about her work and he tells her about his and they sit and have coffee together in the afternoon--he has tea, but they chat to each other with the FaceTime cameras on while he boils the water his electric kettle because “it gets the temperature perfect, Swan, you don’t want to burn the tea” and Emma pops a K-cup in the machine and waits for the sweet, life-giving elixir to drip into her mug and she’s laughing about Leo the Rabbit when he takes a sip and smiles and says, “Ah, yes, Dave mentioned.”

And Emma--stops.

“Dave?” she asks stupidly. “My brother David? You talked to--”

“My best friend of the past fifteen years?” Killian asks. “Aye, Swan, I talk to him frequently.”

“What about, like, Robin and Will and those guys?” 

“I didn’t realize I was only allowed to have local friends, love,” he says, but there’s something off in his tone.

“What did he say? David, I mean?”

Killian puts the mug down. “About Leo?” He looks confused.

“About me,” Emma says. “Did you tell him about--”

“Is it a secret?” He grabs the mug again but sloshes some of the tea and Emma can see him, the way his fingers clench and the muscle in his jaw is tight. He’s angry now.

“No,” Emma says, but she says it too quickly and she knows he can see that she’s nervous.

“But you didn’t tell him.”

“No,” Emma says. “What was there to tell?”

“Dunno,” he says, his affect flat and dull. “I told him how thrilled I was that we had taken this chance to reconnect, how it was something to look forward to when everything is literally shit. I told him how much I’d missed you and how much I love getting to see you everyday and hear about your ridiculous cat and listen to you laugh and show you the sunset and get to _know_ you again. But you’re right.” He picks up the mug and holds it over his lips as he says, “Nothing much to tell, is there.”

“I didn’t know what to say!”

“You never do, do you, Swan?”

Emma’s silent. That’s unfair. And mean. And--

Accurate.

(She’s the one who’d stopped calling, last time. Stopped returning his calls. Stopping talking to him, ducked out when David asked about him.)

“Can’t let this be _real_ , is that it?”

(It is.)

“That’s why you stopped--” he pauses, swallows “--before, isn’t it? Never came to visit, never wanted to talk about it. Because then it would be real. Then you’d have to make _choices_.”

“I didn’t want you to come back just for me,” she says. “We were kids. It would have been ridiculous. You’d have always regretted it.” 

(Regretted me, she doesn’t say.)

“That’s what you thought?” 

“I was right, too--look at your life. Look at how hard you’ve worked!”

“We could have had that _together_. I wanted you to come here and be with me.”

“I couldn’t,” Emma says. “I would have always regretted it. I was never meant to be the girl who changed all of her plans for a guy. That’s just not who I was. I would have fucked it up or left or waited for you to get tired of me and you _would_ have, you know it. We both had a lot of growing up to do.”

“Aye, look out for yourself and never get hurt, is that it?” He looks away; up at the ceiling, down at Westley, who barks appreciatively when Killian gives him a scratch behind the ears. He looks out the window on his river view and says, “For someone who didn’t know what to say, Swan, I’d say you articulated that pretty well. Too bad you couldn’t have said something years ago.”

“Killian,” she says. “Talking to you is the best part of my day. I mean that.”

He looks up at her through his stupidly long eyelashes and the jaw muscle softens. 

It’s not much, but it’s not nothing.

“Aye, love,” he says, “mine too.”


	11. prompt eleven:  light

They had one rule--no daylight--and she’d just broken it. 

_Fuck_.

Emma Swan rolled over, the sheet slipping away from her in the bed that wasn’t hers, sunlight streaming in through the open curtains. 

_Fucking hell_.

No daylight. It was supposed to be simple--no rules, no strings, no limits, just the two of them giving in to what they wanted and what they needed with no expectations and _no daylight_ and his side of the bed was empty but it was too much to hope that she was alone in the apartment because _he lived here,_ for fuck’s sake.

That wasn’t even her biggest problem.

No, her biggest problem was that after she’d gotten up to clean up and use the bathroom--ignoring the toothbrush there that was hers or the hairbrush she’d left on the vanity--instead of pulling her jeans back on to go she’d climbed right back into the king-sized piece of cloud he called a mattress and rolled over onto her stomach and felt his arm around the back of her waist and his nose against her shoulder as he pressed scratchy little kisses there, the stubble of his beard tickling her. And instead of getting up--or at least going in for another round--she’d turned and looked at him with his deep blue eyes and the way they stared at her and she’d _kissed him_.

She’d kissed him and she hadn’t made out with someone like that since she was a teenager, _god_ , just lying there and feeling the other person against her as the kisses went from sweet to sexy and back again, her heart pounding as his eyelashes brushed against her cheeks and she felt the softness of his hair in her fingers and then she’d fallen asleep in his arms.

“Goodnight, love,” he’d whispered into her ear and she’d snuggled in closer.

This. Was. A. Problem.

Ruby was going to be insufferable, all kinds of “I told you so” and “You and Killian Jones are not going to be able to be just fuck buddies”; Emma’s protests of “I don’t even _like_ him” being dismissed with a knowing grin and “mm-hmmm”.

She didn’t like him. She _didn’t_. She--he--

\--And their history wasn’t exactly _great_ , was it, they’d been going at it like cats and dogs since he’d shown up with David one night at the bar and she’d actually punched him once.

He’d deserved it.

 _Sexual tension_ \--no, fuck literally all of that.

Only she already had, and now she was here. In the daylight. With a disgruntled moan Emma hauled herself up from the bed and looked for her jeans on the floor, her jeans and her clothes and her underwear, her stupid black lace bra that was her favorite because it was comfortable and she liked it under her white tank top and _not_ because _he_ liked it under her white tank top. She pulled her clothes on and brushed her hair (with her hairbrush) and brushed her teeth (with her toothbrush) and peeked out the cracked-open bedroom door like an absolute asshole, one eye lined up along the crack only to see him staring right back at her with that stupid, _stupid_ grin he had, his eyes twinkling in the goddamn daylight, a cup of coffee already in front of him and a mug set out for her, and if he said something ridiculous like “good morning, sunshine” she would punch him again.

“Hi,” was all he said, but his smile didn’t fade and the twinkle in his eyes got brighter, like he was happy to see her. The mug wasn’t empty, either; it was full of coffee mixed with exactly the amount of milk and sugar she liked, which was basically “just enough coffee to let the sugar dissolve”.

Since when did Killian Jones know how she took her coffee?

“Um,” she said, very eloquently. “So...should we talk?”

Stupid, stupid, _stupid_ , Emma, just take the coffee and _go already_ \--

“I’d like that,” he said, his face softening and not going immediately for his “that’s not going to be a pleasant conversation” frown. “Go on a date with me.”

“I-- _what_?”

He shrugged. “We tried just fucking each other, and I’d like to--”

“Well, we just needed to get it out of our systems!”

“Did it work?” The look he gave her, that was also A Problem. “Am I out of your system?”

It was a staring contest and she broke first because _damn him_.

“Right,” he said, “So I would like to propose a new arrangement, one where we spend time together.”

Emma said, “We do spend--”

“In the daylight, love,” he said, gesturing with his coffee cup. “Doing things other than fucking. Not that I have any opposition to that, just to be clear.”

“Of course you don’t,” Emma muttered. “Since when does Killian Jones date?”

His eyes weren’t twinkling, they were deadly serious when he said, “Since I met you.”

 _Oh_.

“Being with you, it’s like being a part of something,” he said. “And you feel it too, I know how deeply you care about things, about the people in your life, your friends, your family--”

“You?”

“Aye, me,” he said. “And I, you. Can’t you see a future here, Emma? A happy one?”

She could. That was part of the Problem.

“I care,” she said softly. It was hardly more than a whisper and she said it mostly to her coffee cup. “Of course I care.”

“Emma, please,” he said, his eyes still serious and his voice very low. “Go on a date with me.” He put his mug down and stepped toward her, very slowly. He took the mug from her hands and put it on the counter and pulled her hands into his and looked into her eyes through his eyelashes, his stupid long eyelashes and put his forehead against hers and said, “Please.”

It was the ‘please’ that got her.

“Okay,” she said, closing her eyes and leaning into him.


	12. prompt twelve:  meet cute

Really it was the shoes that were the problem. Six-inch platform pumps were not designed with running in mind, even if that’s exactly what Emma Swan usually ended up doing with them. She practiced--not on purpose, and not by choice--at least a couple of nights a week, but it never got any easier.

There was definitely a joke about the patriarchy and the unrealistic feminine beauty standards of a world dominated by men in there somewhere but she was fucking _crushing_ the patriarchy tonight in her six-inch pumps, or at least she was trying to, because that was her specialty.

Okay, maybe it was dark bars full of people making bad decisions that were an Emma Swan specialty, but tonight that included Asshole Number 349 who thought it would be fun to skip out on his child support, which definitely made him the kind of asshole who deserved to be crushed under her platform pumps when she got her hands--and her cuffs--on him and dragged him in for processing.

 _Oooooof_.

Emma went down hard in a heap on the pavement, her ankle twisted under her weight and the shoe’s inability to support her when she tripped and ran into--

_Oh._

Emma blinked.

She shook her head.

She blinked again.

Because this man could _not_ be real.

It was not possible for a man to be _this_ beautiful.

Oh, _shit_ , had she said that out loud?

No. Emma shook her head again. No.

He stared at her, too. Blue eyes ringed in eyeliner, kohl smudged under the waterline. Blue button-up shirt--partially undone, matched his eyes, would look even better on the floor--buttoned waistcoat, jeans that showed off his--

“Fuck,” she said--definitely out loud, and it sounded a kind of like a whimper, so, great first impression there, right?

“Bloody hell,” he said at the same time, and he sounded winded, so at least she’d knocked him a bit off his ass, too.

Literally.

“I’m sorry,” she said, watching as he stood and extended his hand to pull her up. She hopped a bit, which was definitely not dignified, but her ankle really _did_ hurt.

Fucking patriarchy.

He watched her; Emma saw his eyes go from the shoes up her legs--subtle, dude--past her pink dress that was tight, short, shiny and always got the job done, to her leather jacket, and if he said _one word_ about the heels she was going to drive one so far up his ass that--

“I’m not,” he said. His accent was clearer now. British. Something like that, and, what?

“What?” she said.

He shrugged. The eyes glinted as he smiled and she liked the way they crinkled a little bit at the edges as he ran a hand through his thick, dark hair and the rings he wore on his fingers glinted in the streetlights. “When an angel tumbles straight from heaven, I’m not going to question being lucky enough to break her fall.”

She stared at him again and he stared back, and the smile on his face was contagious; she knew just by looking at him that it had gotten him out of trouble more times than it should have and Emma couldn’t help it.

She burst out laughing.

So did he.

“Are you _kidding_ me? You say that to people?”

“Shouldn’t I?” She liked the way his eyebrow went up in playful challenge.

“You can’t talk like that when you look like--”

Oops.

The eyebrow and the smile were doing some kind of witchcraft on her insides, that was the only explanation. She’d hit her head.

“What about you, love?” he said. “What else is a man supposed to think when fortune has seen fit to grant him such favor as this?”

Emma rolled her eyes and he winked, making her laugh again. She shifted her weight and winced.

“My brother owns the bar down the block,” he said, noticing. “May I escort you there? You can rest.”

“I can walk there just fine,” she grumbled.

“Of course you can,” he agreed. “But why, having found you, would I want to let you out of my sight so soon?”

He held out his arm for her to take with a little bow and said, “Killian Jones, at your service.”

“Swan,” she said. “Emma Swan.”

\--

“Oh,” Ruby said the next day. “That’s totally it, then.”

“What?” Emma said, shifting the ice pack on her swollen ankle.

“The story I’m telling at your wedding,” she said with a shrug.

\--

And it was.

Emma wore her six-inch platforms and as she walked up to him he leaned over, his mouth hovering above her ear.

"Hey, beautiful," he whispered. "So, do you believe in love at first sight, or should I walk by again?"

-30-


	13. prompt thirteen:  music

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> prompt #14 (metamorphosis) can be found in the story [from the edge of the deep green sea](https://archiveofourown.org/works/25850881)
> 
> it's a long one-shot 3A canon divergence with a lot of Feelings  
> \--
> 
> this is a continuation of prompts two, four, six and ten.

The music is cranked up but not so loud that Emma doesn't hear the pounding on the door.

"Emma!" It's Mary Margaret, her sister-in-law. "Emma, open up!"

Emma turns the volume louder, but she can still hear Mary Margaret's exasperated sigh. "Emma," she says, "I have a key and I will use it."

Just because she can, she flips the volume switch on the speaker all the way up before she opens the door. "You know you shouldn't come in," Emma says in lieu of a greeting.

"I know." Mary Margaret has nothing but sympathy in her eyes. "How about, instead, you put on a pair of shoes and come for a walk with me? Turn off Ruby Lucas' breakup playlist and--" she spots the open bottle of red wine on the counter "--clear your head."

Ruby Lucas' tried-and-true formula of wine and Jagged Little Pill deserves more than "breakup playlist" in its defense but Emma is worn down and a little bit tipsy and, in spite of everything, kind of happy to see her sister-in-law.

"Come on, Em," she says. "Walk with me."

\--

He hadn't called and it still hurts.

"Talking to you is the best part of my day," she'd said, and he'd agreed, and then--

Nothing.

"You're not happy about it," Mary Margaret says. It's not a question but Emma nods her head anyway and it's kind of the first time she's admitting it to anyone except Alanis. It's a relief, and her entire body sags from the comfort.

"I miss him, okay?" she says. It's only been two days. "I didn't realize, and I guess--"

"You never asked, you mean," Mary Margaret says, and Emma glares. She's relieved to have said it but it doesn't mean she wants to go full-on catharsis with her sister-in-law in the middle of the street where they're walking. And the way Mary Margaret says it, like it's something easy, as though when you ask people things--the really hard things--you don't have anything to fear from their answer--

Emma sighs.

"What did you fight about?"

"Oh, he--" Called her out. Said what he meant. 

She'd forgotten that he did that, that she could push him and expose the temper and the fire that he usually kept buried just as easily as he could read her and push her and set her aflame with his touch and his eyes and his--

Missing him now was just as scary as missing him had been then. It's scary to see him again, to remember the way it had been and the way she'd been. Sometimes she missed it more than she remembered it, the way he was, the way she'd felt with him, and the hurt feelings as the distance had started to feel even farther and the time apart even longer and the day she'd realized that he had a new life there and she had one here.

If she'd gone--or if he'd stayed--

But that was history.

Mary Margaret just watches her, all motherly concern and friendly compassion rolled into one even with the home-sewn mask and its cheerful fabric obscuring her expression and Emma wishes they could hug.

"He never stopped loving you," Mary Margaret says, "just like you never stopped loving him. But I think this is a good thing."

"It's a good thing that I'm day-drunk and miserable?"

"It's a good thing that you're having this fight," she says. "And if you every want this to be something again, I think you need to finish it."

Emma's silent.

She does want something with him.

She's tired of fighing it.

"Maybe start by apologizing," Mary Margaret says.

\--

Emma's home and sober and on the couch with Buttercup and the music has been switched from Alanis to something softer and gentler, acoustic guitar and quiet vocals like the kind he used to--

\--

**Emma [11.23 PM]  
**I'm sorry I didn't call

**Emma [11.23 PM]  
**I'm sorry I didn't return your calls

**Emma [11.24 PM]  
**I'm really glad you called me.

\--

Buttercup is purring in her lap, her neck resting on Emma's wrist like a pillow.

\--

**Killian [11.27 PM]  
**It's all right.

**Killian [11.27 PM]  
**Tomorrow?

\--

Emma smiles.


	14. prompt fifteen:  coffee shop AU

This entire thing would have been a lot easier if the coffee was better. Even ‘drinkable’ would have been an improvement.

But the coffee was sludge and there was nothing she could do about it. No amount of sugar, of milk, of cinnamon or cocoa powder could bring this stuff up to scratch but still she went, every day, at the same time. She waited in the queue because in spite of its terrible coffee it was the kind of trendy place that always had a queue, especially in this neighborhood, and she waited.

Same time, every day.

Emma got there at 8:10 so it didn’t look too much on purpose that she was already there and waiting when he strolled in around at 8:15.

Eight-sixteen, today, and she wondered why he was late.

It had been 8:15 on the dot the first time she’d seen him, windswept hair that he brushed out of his face with a hand weighted down by chunky rings that, on anyone else, would have looked like a costume instead of like they were a part of him. They matched his old-fashioned waistcoat that he wore unbuttoned over a blue t-shirt with a V-neck and still managed to make work, somehow, even with the chain dangling down in the vee displaying charms that complemented the rings on his fingers. 

It wasn’t her fault that she got distracted--that was a _lot_ to take in on exactly two hours of sleep, all she’d been allowed after a late night at work and her kid’s early school drop-off and the reason she was suffering through what was possibly the worst coffee in the city just for her caffeine fix.

Only the cup she reached for wasn’t _her_ caffeine fix. It was his.

She knew that immediately and almost spat it out because the coffee that was undrinkable when matched with enough sugar to coat the bottom of the cup, dressed up with vanilla and chai and steamed milk, wasn’t even palatable when served black.

It was his coffee.

And he’d had hers, her vanilla chai latte. Four bucks she was never seeing again, that was for sure, and it wouldn’t really have been a loss at all, he was so goddamn charming about it.

“I’m so sorry,” she’d said.

“No harm done, love,” he’d said, and who the _fuck_ talked like that, anyway? “But if you want to apologize, feel free to really, you know, get into it.”

And he’d _winked_.

And she’d glared.

And that made him laugh, which made her laugh, which made her come back the next day to see if, maybe, he was a regular here, and his eyes lit up from across the room and he’d brought her a vanilla chai latte and said “I was hoping I’d see you again.”

So she kept coming back.

And so did he.

But the coffee, it was _really_ bad, and she couldn’t keep blowing four bucks a day just for all of this bullshit, and that sixty seconds between eight-fifteen and eight-sixteen just felt _really, really_ long today.

“Killian,” she called, because that was his name, he’d told her on day three

“Swan,” he said, his eyes twinkling because she’d told him her last name first and Henry had groaned and glared and introduced himself, stepping in front of her and rolling his eyes the way that only an eleven-year-old could when he extended a hand for Killian to shake.

“It’s a pleasure to meet you, Henry,” he’d said while all of Emma’s mental alarm bells were screaming at her, _too fast too fast too fast_ and she’d debated going back at all.

Wondered if he would, now that he knew she had a kid.

But on day four he’d strolled in with a little girl right behind him, a shy blonde who called him “papa” and introduced herself to Henry as “Alice Jones” and whom Killian called “starfish” and so Emma had gone back on day five.

Today.

“You like him, mom,” Henry said to her, grumbling about the fifth consecutive day of early wake-up calls and _it’s Sunday, mom, seriously_ still echoing under his breath. 

Emma stared at him. “And you’re okay with that, kid?”

He shrugged. “I just want you to be happy,” he said, and sipped his hot chocolate.

Then he made a face, because even the hot chocolate wasn’t good. “But maybe we can be happy somewhere with good hot cocoa?”

She laughed and ruffled his hair and said “Sure, kid,” before she walked over to where Killian was.

“How did you get the lad up so early on a Sunday?” Killian said, waving to Henry at the table.

“Oh,” Emma said, “he’s just here for moral support.”

That sent Killian’s eyebrows up before he smiled, softly, and--hopefully?

“Because I’m here to ask you out,” Emma said. “To dinner, or--”

“Yes,” he said. “I happily accept.”

Emma laughed. “You’re not going to be old-fashioned about this?”

“That depends,” he said. “There are some things a man doesn’t do on the first date, you know.”

Emma took half a step forward and leaned into his space and kissed him, chastely, on the corner of his mouth. “That’s because you haven’t been out with me yet,” she said with a wink.

He was blushing, his finger touching the place where she’d kissed him, but he was smiling, too, and his eyes were doing the thing where they twinkled again as he said, “I look forward to it.”


	15. prompt sixteen:  history

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> this is a continuation of prompts two, four, six, ten and thirteen.

_**It could have gone like this:** _

It’s dinnertime on Tuesday when Killian says, “Swan, I’m leaving.”

It’s take-away sushi, nothing special, but her mouth is full and her body tightens at the words she’s been half expecting for years. Emma swallows, puts her chopsticks down.

“Yeah,” she says. “Okay.”

He exhales and his blue eyes watch her and now he is the one who is waiting. Or maybe he’s been waiting all of this time, too. 

Maybe this is what they call inevitable.

“Scarlet phoned again,” he says.

“Yeah,” she says. “Okay.” 

Scarlet has been phoning at least twice a year since Killian had turned down a job with him in Oregon. _For her_. He turned down a great career. _For her._

And not a day has gone by since then when Emma didn’t think about that.

Her life was here. Her family was here.

And Killian had stayed.

“I just--”

“Killian--”

“You know I’ve never once regretted staying here.” 

“I never asked you to stay.”

A pause.

“No,” he says. “You never did. And you’re not going to now, either. Are you, love?”

She’s not. She _can’t_. It’s just all of these years piled up around her, waiting for the other shoe to drop, waiting for exactly this.

Maybe they’d been too young.

Maybe they’d believed too much in first love.

Maybe they never could have made it work, or maybe Emma just wouldn’t let them. 

“You know I would go to the ends of the world for you,” he says, and it’s broken and half-whispered, an echo of what he had said to her the day that he had stayed.

“I know,” she says.

“You know,” he echoes. “You know, Emma, but you’ve never believed it.”

Maybe he’d believed too much, and Emma hadn’t believed enough.

\--

_**It should have gone like this:** _

It’s Tuesday morning and Emma’s laughing with Ruby at the counter in the diner when the bell over the door rings. She’s not even thinking about it as she half turns, glancing out of the corner of her eye--

\--and it’s like all of the oxygen has been pulled out of her body.

“Oh my god!” Ruby exclaims, throwing her towel on the floor and jumping the counter in spite of her spindled red heels and throwing herself at him. “I had no idea you were back in town!” She hit him in the shoulder, playfully. “All these years, and you’ve never come back to see old friends?”

He laughs. It’s a great sound, even if it’s a little nervous and he hasn’t made eye contact yet even though Emma knows he knows she’s there. Knows it because her body reacted to his presence and she can tell, just by looking at him and his posture and the way that he’s blushing, playing with the hair on the back of his neck (soft, like the skin there, her favorite place to put her fingers). He knows.

Slowly, Emma turns the rest of the way to face him. He’s--just--

If she’s ever had any doubts that the years have been kind to Killian Jones--and she hasn’t, she’s seen pictures--they are immediately dispelled because his eyes still crinkle when he smiles, the way he is smiling right now. At her. The smile splits his face and he says, simply, “Hello, beautiful.”

She smiles back and it’s surprisingly easy, like a missing puzzle piece sliding into place.

“Hi,” she says--shakes her head, giggles, stands up and walks toward him--and then says it again. “Hi.”

She wraps her arms around him, suddenly surrounded by the familiar scent of his soap and his jacket like she hasn’t been since the day he’d left and they’d stopped being _them_. 

“You know I’d go to the ends of the world for you,” he’d said.

“I know,” she’d said. “But this time, you have to go for _you_.”

It had hurt.

It had almost broken her.

But she knew, in her heart, it was the right thing to do. She’d heard about it from David, how great things were for him at his job, at his career, she’d heard the second-hand stories about his friends and the life he’d built for himself three thousand, one hundred and ninety-one miles away from her.

It was fine.

She’d built a life, too. A happy one. Job, career, love, heartbreak, friends, a _home_. Her brother, her sister-in-law, her nephew. No regrets.

But seeing him, after all of this time, in this place--it feels, somehow, inevitable, like it was meant to happen, like maybe they were just waiting for it to be the right time.

“I missed you,” she says, and she means it.

“Aye, love,” he says. “Me too.” 

There’s a future here, she realizes, watching him sit down on the stool next to where she’d been sitting, watching Ruby pour him a cup of coffee as though he’d never left. There’s a future here, and it’s a good one.

\--

 _ **But it actually happened like this**_.

She’s on her third cup of coffee when she decides it’s late enough--time zones--to call him and as it rings she’s seized with the possibility that in spite of what he’d said, he won’t answer.

On the fifth ring it stops, the screen _swooshing_ as the camera connects on his end and--

She stares.

He smirks.

“It’s nothing you haven’t seen before,” he says, and she laughs. He’s soaking wet, his hair sticking up at all angles, and he is bare from her shoulders to where she can see part of his torso. She makes a show of looking him over, letting his eyes roam over him, and shrugs. “Sure you’re not letting yourself go, Jones?”

He laughs.

She smiles and feels herself relax as he puts the phone down and she is treated to the far less exciting view of his ceiling, but only for a minute before he reappears, brushing his fingers through his hair and pulling on the hem of his t-shirt. Emma waits for him to settle, waits for his eyes to focus just on her before she says, “I’m sorry.”

Killian watches her; watches her and waits.

“I talked to Mary Margaret yesterday,” she says. “I told her about you, and this, and--” she gestures, even though all he can see is the phone camera highlighting odd angles of her apartment. “You were right, and I was wrong.”

His lip quirks. Just a bit.

“Frame it, okay? Treasure this moment.”

“Did you feel better, after?” he asks. His voice is gentle, reassuring.

Emma nods. “Yeah.” She inhales. “I missed you the past few days.”

“And I you,” he says. “But I think we need to make a change--”

Emma can feel the blood draining from her face and she sits down, her hand automatically reaching for Buttercup.

“--make things healthier between us,” he finishes. “We need to talk to each other more. Be two adults who respect each other. I want us to fight for this, Emma, not shut down when things get hard, and if you don’t want anyone to know, I’ll--” his fingers are in his hair again “--I’ll be ok. It won’t hurt anyone. It might help us.”

“I want to fight for us too,” she says quickly.

“Yeah?” God, she _loves_ it when he smiles like that.

“Yeah.” She squares her shoulders. “Choosing to see the best doesn’t mean ignoring everything else, right?”

He’s still smiling; Emma doesn’t ever want him to stop.

“Good,” he says.

He doesn’t know everything about her, the dark and messy things. She doesn’t know, either--about him and his life, the things he’s done separate from their shared history, the places he’s been, the things she’s seen, how he’s grown his skills and career, or how she had.

But she can tell him.

She can listen.

That’s the first night they leave the phone line open and when she wakes up and it’s quiet and there’s a split second where she wants to panic until--

She hears his breathing.

The comforting rhythm of his inhalations and exhalations, and a snore that must be Westley.

Emma re-arranges her pillow, pulls her blanket up to her chin, and turns on her side to face the phone. She feels a sense of relief. It’s fine.

It’s--better than fine.

It’s hope.


	16. prompt seventeen:  cooking

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> this piece was inspired by @RecoveringTheSatellites [ All The Darkness In The World](https://t.umblr.com/redirect?z=https%3A%2F%2Farchiveofourown.org%2Fworks%2F20954474&t=ZTM3YjM2NjY5M2JkNmQ2OTA3MmNhNzk4OGYxZjA4N2U1NmIwZGFkMywzZDhkN2VlM2UxNzk5YjM2YjA2YjlhNzY0MWQ4ZGU0ODc1MGM1Njhi&ts=1597708581), which i’ve borrowed from her with permission, sanction, support and cheerleading. 
> 
> (don’t even ask me how i got here. it made sense in my head.)

Some spells can rip your life wide open--can ricochet back as you cast them, do more damage to you than to your intended victim. All of them can do worse, so much worse, than simply end a heartbeat.

Though they can do that, too; he has the headstone to prove it.

_KILLIAN JONES_

The dirt is still fresh and he can smell it, the turned earth in the night air (he can smell the flowers in the field as they were when he lay dying) just like how he can close his eyes and smell the curse as it cooked, as it combined and released itself, as he crushed Merlin’s heart in his hands.

The anger and the madness are slowly fading, but the magic--

Is not.

It pulls at him, tearing, ripping; darkness howling inside of him until he can no longer think or feel or _be_

humming between his fingertips, thrumming in time with his heartbeat.

Or hers, when she finds him.

(She always finds him.)

He leaves her a note, _I’ve gone for a walk. I love you. --K_.

And she finds him.

He feels her as she draws nearer, feels the power in her as it calls to the power in him, as like magic calls to like, for just as he is not free of it, neither is she; but then there is the light.

 _Her_ light, and it calls to him, too as it hums and resonates and finds every crack in his battered ego, in his bruised pride, of his broken resolve--it finds the cracks and shines through.

For what is a crack, if not a way for the light to get in?

The Darkness had broken them almost beyond repair; it is the light that lets them forgive themselves, and each other, for what had happened--for what they had done.

To themselves.

To each other.

Because they choose to.

Emma comes up behind him and wraps her arms around his torso and there is the weight of her head against his shoulder as he focuses his intentions, his will, as he lifts his hand and the stone bearing his name vanishes.

There is the release of her held breath as warmth against his body.

(The rhythm of her heart beating in time with his.)

Her hand in his as they turn, together, and--

“I love you,” she says. “Let’s go home.”


	17. prompt eighteen:  myth

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> loosely--very loosely--inspired by _trisan and isolde_

She dreamed about the ship the night before she died. It had black sails, unfurled and full of wind that she could feel as it teased her hair. It was empty but she could feel the ghost of his fingertips against her skin, her cheek and her arm and her wrist, the only places he had ever touched her, for he was a man of honor.

He whispered into her ear: “Perhaps one day we will meet again, as characters from a different story.” He kissed her cheek. “Maybe we’ll share a lifetime then.”

And he was gone.

Eama woke up in a flush of heat and sweat and grief, channeling her energy and lighting the candle by her bedside. It flared and dimmed, her power not fully under her control as she grasped for the holder and nearly tumbled to the floor.

The hallway was nearly empty, only the torches lit as they led to the king’s antechamber and the men who stood watch. They bowed to her and pushed the doors open; she barely stopped to nod her thanks before she stood inside and caught her breath. There was one torch that stayed lit, always; it illuminated the fresco, the moment of victory over the Dragon.

The moment that sealed her fate.

Above the fray flew a bird, a single strand of golden hair in its beak.

Her hair, according to the stories that had already become legends. She stood in the sunlight with the sword in her hands, triumphant.

Cursed, though she had not yet known it.

Eama heard the footsteps of the king and waited, her knees bent and her head lowered. She did not flinch away from his touch when his hand brushed against her shoulder.

“My dear,” Lowen said. His voice was full of concern and affection, nothing more--but nothing less, for he did care for her. Eama suddenly felt foolish, standing in the king’s antechamber in her sleeping shift and nothing else on the basis of a dream. But as he took in her posture, her expression, something in him shifted as he understood that something extraordinary had brought her here. She did not typically share these rooms with him.

The queen’s apartments were separate.

“Kenwyn is dead,” she said, and took a harsh and wholly unfair satisfaction in seeing the blood drain from his face, in seeing his hands tremble--in guilt, in rage, in regret? Eama did not know.

She did not care.

“Tomorrow, a ship will arrive in the harbor bearing black sails,” she said. “Kenwyn’s effects will be returned to us.” His effects, but not his body. Kenwyn was a man of the sea and would have been returned to its embrace once his spirit departed from this realm.

“Was he successful in his quest?” The words were strained, and well they should be. Kenwyn had left because of them, as surely as if they had sent him away.

Not a day went by where she did not think of him.

Eama shook her head. “I know not.”

“Will you--” Lowen stopped.

Eama waited.

“Will you go to him?”

“I will,” she said.

\--

When the ship dropped anchor, when its crew disembarked with black armbands adorning their uniforms in honor of their fallen captain, she was there.

Eama received the small box and the condolences and hid her tears until she opened it, retrieving from its depths a ring on a chain.

She put it around her neck and, as the sun set and the sky grew dark, walked aboard the ship.

It was the last time anyone ever saw her.

\--

The sign said ‘Welcome to Storybrooke’ with its stupid ‘e’ and its ‘ye olde smol towne’ charm and she probably would have fallen for it if her car hadn’t broken down right at the goddamn town line.

It was cold, too, so that was _awesome_.

Emma Swan was leaning against the side of her car, contemplating her breath in the cold when the black Chevelle pulled up next to her. Damn thing looked even older than her yellow Beetle, which made her smile.

The Chevelle’s owner smiled right back. “Car trouble?”

“Not at all,” Emma said. “Just enjoying this fabulous weather.”

“Ah, I see. So I don’t suppose you’d like a lift the rest of the way into town, then?”

Emma laughed. “Actually, I just talked to Gus at the garage, he’s gonna send a tow.”

“Don’t deprive a man of a dashing rescue,” he said, pouting.

Emma eyed the car. “Your heat works?”

“You have no idea,” he said, rolling his tongue over his lips and waggling his eyebrows.

Emma raised an eyebrow of her own and his smile shifted into something more genuine. “Get in, it’s no problem.”

“Can you drop me at the library?”

“Ah,” he said. “Are you, by chance, Emma Swan?”

Emma eyed him. It was probably a really stupid idea to get into a car with a strange guy who knew her name but Emma had her gun and could probably break several bones in his body before he'd even realized what was happening. She opened the door and climbed in. “I am.”

“Killian Jones,” he said, watching her buckle the seat belt before offering a hand to shake.

Emma took it, feeling suddenly flustered. When she’d phoned to make an appointment with Dr. Killian Jones, a thirty-something gorgeous British man in a car that was possibly older than either of them was not exactly what she had in mind and the frisson that ran through her when their hands touched was also definitely unexpected.

His hand was so warm.

She wanted to pull away but also never to let go and they just sat there, staring at each other, their hands wrapped around each other’s over the gearshift until he cleared his throat and blinked and pulled away.

Emma sighed. In relief.

In disappointment.

“At least now I needn’t worry about being late for our appointment,” he said. “Seems a bit like fate, yeah? Are you warming up, Swan?”

“Yeah,” she said. The shivering had been replaced by a tingling, but she definitely wasn’t cold.

“And you have the ring you were asking about?”

Emma nodded.

“Wonderful,” he said. He shifted and drove over the town line and into Storybrooke.

Awesome.


	18. prompt twenty:  loss

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> this is a companion piece to prompt seven

Sometimes the days feel like years.

They blur into each other seamlessly, the Darkness and the Underworld and when she’d said “I’ll sleep for weeks as soon as we defeat Hades” she hadn’t realized that she meant it _literally_ , like her body was catching up on six weeks’ worth of magically-induced insomnia all at once.

She’s cold, too, her body still remembering the way it felt in the world Below and the whiplash of it after six weeks of not feeling much at all; she pulls the blankets around her and wears her heavy coat and the only thing that keeps her warm is the nearness of him.

She worries when he can’t sleep but there’s a part of her that worries even more when he does, that can only process his closed eyes and still form the way it was when he’d been dead, when she’d held him and felt the looseness and then the stiffness as the life left him because of a wound she’d inflicted. She remembers her mother’s arms and her whisper and how inadequate it had been in the face of her loss.

“Everyone I’ve ever loved is dead,” she’d said, and he wasn’t supposed to be one of them--he’d promised--and now she has him back and it’s hard for them to be together but it’s even harder when they are apart.

When she wakes up and he is gone, she feels like crying.

When she wakes up and he is there, tossing and turning and looking at her with his sadness and frustration and hurt, she feels like screaming. The anger is there--the anger that was always a part of her, that had followed her for twenty-eight years and had finally started to dissipate--and it flares up and manifests in the magic running through her hands as she tries to calm him.

Tries to calm both of them.

“I’ve never known you to need to get ready for a fight,” he’d said. “I thought it was a natural state,” and maybe it had been and maybe it hadn’t but it certainly was _now_ and she can’t say anything, can’t do anything, because she did this.

It’s better to just let him walk.

It’s better just to wait.

But sometimes she can’t help herself and she’s pacing the floors of their house and he comes home and he finds her curled up against the basement door that doesn’t have a lock anymore; curled up with her back to it to make sure that everything she’d kept locked in there never gets out again, and he holds her. He presses kisses into her hair and holds her hand in his and she wraps his arm around herself and lays her head on his shoulder and it’s not enough but also it’s _everything_.

Because he came home.

He came back to her.

He chose _her_.

Sometimes she rests her head against his chest, on top of her hand, so she can listen to his heartbeat. She breathes and counts and inhales and exhales as though she is doing it for both of them, to remind him how, and then the magic that flows through her is cool and blue and white and Light.

“Tell me something you know is true,” she whispers.

And every time-- _every time_ \--he says, “I love you.”

It warms her straight through to her toes.


	19. prompt nineteen:  de-ageing

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> canon compliant post-7x02

It’s still early--barely daylight--but Emma knows he’s up, because he’s always up just with the sunrise. He’s watching her, she can feel it, and so she rolls over to face him and his blue eyes and his soft morning smile, the only that only she ever gets to see.

There are wrinkles at the corners of his eyes when he smiles and for the first time Emma notices they’ve gotten deeper.

It’s weird.

He does still--in his own words--”retain his youthful glow”--but he has laugh lines now and crinkles in his forehead. So does she.

But it’s still weird, it _was_ weird, to see him like that, to see him with straggly grey hair and too much weird on his middle and she’d been able to push it out of her mind completely--just an anomaly, just the magic, just the other realm--until she’d seen him again. Hook--the _other_ Hook--had been different. He still carried the weight of his years even when they hadn’t been obvious from his appearance and she hadn’t even noticed.

“What are you thinking, love?” Killian asks, running his hand down her arm and resting his fingers at her wrist.

“Was it strange for you? To see yourself like that?”

“Honestly, Swan, it was a relief.”

“A relief?”

“He thought that he could never find love,” Killian says, “but he was wrong. He made a lot of mistakes. He’ll make many more. But he chose to try and be a better man for his daughter and in making that choice he opened himself to love.”

They’re both silent for a moment.

“I think he’ll see that through,” Killian says. “I think we made the right choice in leaving him with the lad. He’ll take it seriously. And Henry will help him find the girl, just as you said.”

“I wonder why my magic responded to him,” Emma says. “

“I believe that’s why, love,” Killian says, moving her hand toward his lips. “We still had that in common, in spite of where our paths had diverged.”

“What’s that?”

“The choice,” Killian says. “The choice to be a part of something.” He kisses her hand and turns it over, pressing kisses into her palm.

“That’s sweet,” Emma says. “It’s also not what I meant when I asked you if it was weird to see yourself like that.”

“Older, you mean?” He smiles. “But still devilishly handsome, of course.”

“Of course,” she says, but her smile fades, just a bit because--in spite of everything they’ve been through--it’s really only just occurring to her, that in making his choice to be a part of something or whatever, he gave up more than his revenge. He’s going to age, now. He’s voluntarily chosen to bring his life to an end, in a way.

“I never intended to live as long as I have,” he says, reading her the way he always does. “I never sought out immortality. My time games with Neverland were just that--games. A stopgap measure. I anticipated my end would shortly follow the crocodile’s. And look, love, look at what immortality has brought him. Look at the choices he’s made for himself because he believes he has forever.”

He’s quiet for a minute after that and when he speaks again his voice is different; lower, softer. Serious.

“Look at the choices we made, when faced with it.”

She pulls his hand in hers against her heart.

“However long we have, whether it be long or short, knowing it will end gives it meaning. Being here with you, being a part of Henry’s life, raising our child, growing old surrounded by love instead of hate--knowing that we’ve fought for our happy ending, that’s what makes the rest of it count. That is what we chose, in that cave and on that elevator, when you chose me and I chose you.”


	20. prompt twenty-one:  family

It’s been years and Henry still has a terrible poker face; just, he’s really bad at lying, which is pretty dumb considering who his family is, he must get that from Grandpa, because out of all of them Prince Charming is hands down the worst liar in the group. So of course Killian immediately suspects something.

Like, jeez, it’s just an envelope, it’s not a Dark Curse. The Black Fairy, or--crap, his _grandfather_ \--would never be so boring. He can imagine the dismissive handwave from Regina, too, all _how pedestrian_ , like she’s never seen something so ridiculous in her life. Seriously. 

It’s an envelope that Henry spent way too long looking at over at Doc’s--not the envelope, really, but what’s inside of it, and the way he sweated over every word even though he was literally writing it with a magical pen.

His handwriting is awful and Killian likes to tease him about it and Henry always laughs and says, “Whatever, old man, some of us didn’t have actual centuries to practice our copperplate and make it perfect.”

Belle always laughs, too, when he says that. The way that Belle laughs at Killian makes Henry laugh, too, and it fills up the library shelves while they’re re-stacking or sitting in the back room drinking her favorite tea or just reading, Henry begging Belle to pull in subscriptions to his favorite comics while Killian--badly--attempts to catch up on a couple of centuries of pop culture. 

He still hasn’t seen _Star Wars_ , but that is mostly because whenever Emma says “Hey, you wanna go home and see what’s on Netflix?” that’s Henry’s cue to stay at Regina’s, instead. He’s got enough emotional scars already without having to listen to _that_.

And sometimes it’s really obvious that Killian’s only known a few kids in his entire life, like when he winks and says, “Come now, lad, enjoyment of sexual activities can be an important part of your life” and Henry tries not to vomit or roll his eyes--but then again, there’s Violet, isn’t there? And Henry knows who he’ll be going to with any Questions he has on that front when he’s ready. If he’s ready.

But his mom is happy, like--so, so, happy--happy in ways that Henry didn’t know a person could be happy. And it’s because of Henry, true, and also because of his grandparents and even Regina but it’s mostly because of Killian.

Henry’s happy, too, happy in ways he didn’t know he could be when he was ten years old and knocking on a stranger’s door in Boston after stealing a credit card and getting on a bus with a storybook that turned out to be real.

Hence the envelope. And the card.

They’re not big on holidays in Storybrooke except for that one freak year during the curse when they’d all remembered Valentine’s Day, all the other days subsumed by apocalypses and impending doom, which was probably why Doc had so many cards in stock. Most of them are out of date and really weird, but it’s June and time hasn’t stopped--yet--this year, or at least it hasn’t since the last curse, and the Black Fairy is behind them and his mom got _married_.

Henry hadn’t even known that was a thing she’d wanted to do, but leave it to the three-hundred-year-old self-proclaimed ‘man of honor’ to get all traditional about things, and now--well. Henry’s got a big family these days but he doesn’t have a dad and he misses his father but really it’s more like he misses the _idea_ of him because he’d barely known Neal at all and then he was gone and his mom was really kind of a wreck about it and Killian had been the one to explain it to him, about his complicated history with Neal and Emma’s complicated history with Neal.

Killian had explained a lot of things. Astronomy and sword fighting and how to cheat at dice and how to win at cards and how to fight dirty when you had to but how to always avoid fighting dirty by having a plan for every situation. How to sail and tie knots and built fires and how to cook, because Killian refused to let his mother do anything besides occasionally scramble eggs.

“The trick with food is to make it edible, love,” he said whenever Emma complained, but Henry always put his foot down when it came to the subject of boiled mackerel.

There’s lox and bagels for breakfast on the morning of the third Sunday in June; or at least, Henry had sweet-talked Emma into poofing some up from New York because Maine had a lot of things but lox and bagels only counted when they were from New York.

But before they eat, Henry hands the envelope to Killian.

Killian holds it and stares and, finally, after deeming the pieces of paper non-threatening, slits the edge with his hook. There’s a swift intake of breath and the card is back on the table and Henry’s pulled into a hug that almost rivals one of Grandpa’s.

The card is mostly blank except for Henry’s sub-par but still magical handwriting where it says _Thank you, Dad._

“You’re welcome, my boy,” Killian whispers.


	21. prompt twenty-two:  pet shop

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> a continuation of prompts two, four, six, ten, thirteen and sixteen

Your brother came to see me and that’s how I got Westley, did I ever tell you that?

After Milah left.

Milah, she--we weren’t good for each other, not really, but in so many ways we _were_. I loved her. She loved me. And neither of us wanted to care about the wreckage we left behind us because we were so swept up in it, even when it was hard, when it hurt, when it was terrible, when she was angry, when I was--

(Killian’s voice is low and soft, full of meaning, full of _emotion_ , disembodied over the phone line and whispering into her ear.)

But then she left.

And it gutted me. Nothing had hurt me so much in years, not since--

Not since you.

And I was a mess. I was drinking too much. I was avoiding everything and everyone and your brother showed up one day on a weekend I’d forgotten he was coming. Or maybe I hadn’t forgotten--maybe I was ignoring it, hoping he’d forget, because I couldn’t face him in the state I was in. He just showed up at my door and pounded until I let him in, Will and Robin right behind him, and Dave, he just shoved me toward the shower and stood there until he heard the water running; I’m honestly surprised he didn’t come in to check on me.

But then again, he’s a married man.

(Emma can hear the smirk and she sighs, a sound that is part laugh and part--something else.)

(Something sad and wistful because she can picture the look on his face and it makes her want to smile even though her insides are turning somersaults and her heart is racing.)

(He needs to tell her this story.)

(She needs to listen.)

And Rob and Will, they’ve cleaned up the mess I’ve made--which Will is still ragging me for--and ordered food and they sat me down and watched me eat it and let me tell you, love, I was a right shit about it.

I’m sure you find that difficult to believe.

But they just ignored me, turned on the television and talked over me and sat there with me on my couch for hours until I kicked them out. Except for Dave.

Dave wouldn’t leave. Just sat there, watching me, saying nothing.

And the next day he takes me to the animal shelter and I tell him he’s absolutely mental, out of his head. I can’t take care of another life. I’m a mess. I’m broken.

But then there’s this dog.

I walk in, and there he is, just staring at me. And he’s got--you’ve seen him, Swan, he’s got big blue eyes and this black mask covering half of his face. He’s got a patch on his belly that looks like it’s in the shape of a heart and this dog barks at me and wags its tail.

And I turn to your brother and he’s just looking at me and then he says, ‘Killian, you have to get your shit together.’

The dog’s watching us, still wagging its tail, and Dave says, ‘Get your shit together and call Emma.’

(Emma’s intake of breath is, she’s sure, quite audible over the phone.)

(Westley grunts in the background.)

I’m not going to lie to you, love, I got angry then. Almost yelled in the middle of the shelter. ‘I don’t know what you’re going on about,’ I said. ‘Your sister left a long time ago. This has nothing to do with her.’

Your brother, he gets so self-righteous when he’s on his high horse and he looks at me and he says, ‘Maybe not. But what’s that line from that movie you always used to watch with her? Something about death and true love.’

(Death cannot stop true love. All it can do is delay it for a while.)

I tried to tell him he was wrong, that this was about Milah, but--anyway. I fill out the paperwork. I bring the dog home and I can’t look at him and not think of you, and that movie. We go for walks and I get some fresh air and exercise and I clear my head and I get my shit together, because your brother’s a stubborn ass but he’s also usually right about that kind of thing.

But you already know how the story ends, don’t you?

(She does.)

(But she wants him to tell her.)

And then everything happens. The world changed. It’s work from home and much shorter walks for Westley and every day he just stares at me through his mask and I can’t stop thinking about you, Emma. And all of this time, all of this distance between us, it can’t stop true love. It can only delay it for a while.

(She’ll never doubt it again.)


	22. prompt twenty-four:  true love's kiss

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Canon divergence 3x11, "Going Home"

What happened was this.

There was a curse. Massive, billowing plumes of goddamn purple smoke--Emma had seen pictures, but the storybook had not done them justice. They were ominous, they were terrifying, they were heading straight for them, spilling out from the Wishing Well right down Main Street and pushing up against the town line.

They only had a few minutes left and Emma felt every second ticking by--this was not supposed to happen. Maybe she’d been hanging out too much with her kid, The Heart of the Truest Believer and all of that, but she _wanted_ to believe and they’d gotten him back from fucking Peter Pan, hadn’t they? They’d flown on a pirate ship with a magical shadow and put a magical freaking barrier around his heart so that a demon couldn’t steal it. They’d figured out the evil plan, they’d done all of the things.

All of the things.

And still, this was how it was going to end: another curse. Everyone separated. No happy endings.

Emma was feeling that, all of it, as the seconds ticked by and the smoke got closer and she could hear the screams in town, Grumpy chief among them--“It’s coming, it’s coming,” like they didn’t already know that. Like they couldn’t see it.

Her parents were watching her and it was just--it was so _stupid_ , all of this best chance bullshit, but now she had to make a choice about _her_ kid, the choice she never got to make last time, to keep him safe because she could and that made it not much of a choice at all. But she was going to miss her parents, and it would be worse now than it had been, now that she knew she’d _had_ parents, parents that wanted her and loved her even if she hadn’t quite relaxed enough to let herself believe it. Henry was in their arms, one last hug from his grandparents, from Regina, and Emma stood by the door of the Beetle and watched them. One last goodbye to Neal and there was a sliver of her that she wasn’t proud of that looked at him and thought, just a little bit, good riddance.

She’d been right in the Echo Cave. It would be easier to have him and all of it behind her forever. Closure she’d never gotten and now it was coming with a bigger price than she’d ever imagined.

She didn’t look at Hook. At _Killian_.

She couldn’t.

He was looking at her, though, eyes drilling straight into her skull, windows into his goddamn soul as she saw everything she’d never let him say to her spilling out. He opened his mouth to speak and Emma had to brace herself.

“That’s quite a vessel you captain there, Swan.”

It wasn’t what she’d expected him to say and that was--it was good. Too many emotions wouldn't help the situation. There was no going back anyway. No undoing the things that had happened--and hadn’t happened--between them. No more apologies or regrets.

So why was she disappointed?

She smiled at him and ignored the tears tickling the corners of her eyes and then he said, “There’s not a day that goes by I won’t think of you.”

And she had been right; it was easier when he didn’t say anything and just let his eyes spill all of his secrets, because that _hurt_. It had been less than a week and she didn’t want to think about how it had happened but he had become her--

 _Something_.

He was _something_. And he was _hers_ \--her rock, her friend, her person. Emma wasn’t someone who believed that people could belong to each other but she knew if she asked him he’d agree, even if he wouldn’t have a week ago.

 _Until I met you_.

Regina pulled her aside because of course there were things the Evil Queen hadn’t felt ready to reveal yet--no rush or anything--and said, “When the curse washes over us, it will send us all back. Nothing will be left behind. Including your memories. It's just what the curse does. Storybrooke will no longer exist. It won't ever have existed. So these last years will be gone from both your memories.”

Emma looked at her parents. At Neal. At Killian.

She couldn’t breathe.

“Now we'll go back to being just stories again.”

She. Couldn’t. Breathe.

Her eyes were on him again as she struggled to get air in her lungs and _fuck it_. Emma took two steps forward and grabbed him just like she’d done in Neverland and this time he didn’t wait to react, to kiss her back; he was all in, a drowning man looking for one last gasp of oxygen. She arched into him and he stole her breath and thoughts and words, his lips and tongue promising everything they could never have.

Emma could taste the salt on her tongue and wasn’t sure if it was from her tears, or his.

She didn’t think. She didn’t _notice_ , not until she pulled herself away and started walking toward the car, reaching blindly for Henry and he wasn’t there.

Panicking, Emma opened her eyes and saw--nothing. No purple smoke. No empty forest. Just the town line sign exactly where it had been, the dwarves’ painted line exactly as it was, everyone staring in strained disbelief, pure joy mixed with confusion on their faces and Emma said to Regina: “What did you do?”

Regina raised her eyebrows the way she did, her arms wrapped tightly around their son. “What did I do, Miss Swan?” The “are you fucking kidding me” was strongly implied so Emma ignored it, turning to her parents and breaking out into a little run as she hurled herself at them. “Mom,” she said. “Dad.”

She felt her father’s hand against the back of her neck and her mother reaching to pull her forehead down close enough to kiss. “You did it,” Mary Margaret whispered. “You saved us.”

Emma stepped back, blinking in confusion. She looked at her father, who shrugged his shoulders; he looked like she’d hit him with another dreamshade-tipped arrow.

Neal wouldn’t meet her eyes, but then again--he’d always been a coward.

Hook-- _Killian_ \--had his fingers pressed up against his lips as he stared at her, his blue eyes unblinking. She’d done a number on his hair when she’d kissed him--

When she’d--

When--

Oh.

 _Oh_.


	23. prompt twenty-five:  drop

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> this is an epilogue to prompt fourteen, [from the edge of the deep green sea](https://archiveofourown.org/works/25850881).

She’s forgotten how it feels to be so cold, all the time. She’s forgotten how it feels to be touched. She’s forgotten what the night air smells like and what his voice sounds like when it whispers in her ear, “Come, love, let’s get you cleaned up.”

She’s forgotten what the _Jolly Roger_ looks like and she’s pretty sure it looks different than it used to. It definitely never had a showerhead before.

“Dave helped me set that up,” he says, his voice turning reminiscent, and for the first time it occurs to Emma Swan to wonder how long she’s been--away--and how many things have changed in her absence.

She’s afraid of the water; in the end, he has to push her, gently. Killian strips himself to his trousers and rolls up the hems and undresses her and every touch of his skin against hers is some kind of promise, his hook smooth and cool against her shoulder or her hip. She should feel naked and exposed--she is both of those things--but mostly, she’s afraid as he eases her under the spigot. The water’s cold and it pushes all of the air out of her body one drop at a time and she gasps, her hand going immediately to her neck and then suddenly it’s gone, Killian in between her and the stream until he nods and says, “Worry not, Swan, it’s quite warm now.”

And it is.

There’s fire inside of her everywhere they touch as he washes her, as he rinses the salt from her arms and her legs and lathers her hair that now goes all the way down to her waist with fingers that dance along her scalp. He doesn’t kiss her and Emma loves him for it--and that is going to take some getting used to, letting herself admit it. She doesn’t say it out loud--she doesn’t say much of anything--but she does lean in and press her lips against his, feather-light and as gentle as his hands had been. He’s still, and patient, and solid next to her even as she can feel him trembling.

“We should go back,” he says. “Your family will be waiting for us.”

She’s forgotten how to call the magic that is her birthright and so he dresses her in his clothes.

She lets him.

Emma should wonder why he didn’t take her straight back to Granny’s or to the loft but she doesn’t, because she’s glad that they had this instead.

\--

It’s bright at the diner, bright and harsh and loud, and there’s so much food; she’s forgotten what grilled cheese tastes like and there’s a minute where she can’t bring herself to eat it but then she does and it’s wonderful, hot and soft and gooey. For the first time Emma almost feels like herself, until she sees--

“Oh my god,” she says. “Henry?”

He’s taller, his hair is desperately in need of a cut and when he speaks his voice wobbles and cracks at irregular intervals--it’s _deeper_.

“Grandma and Grandpa are right behind me,” he says. He looks at Killian. “Grandpa woke up!”

Killian’s smile is wide and bright. “That’s great news, lad.”

When she hugs Henry, he’s almost as tall as she is. She just holds him tighter--her son and her parents in a giant happily-ever-after cuddle, her father’s hand cupping her head and her mother’s kiss on her cheek and then--

Neal.

“Em?”

“Hi.”

He looks at her, and then at his shoes and the floor and at Killian and back at her and it’s an awkward dance but she can see the relief in his eyes and it’s _real_ and so she steps forward and hugs him, too.

“Hi,” he says, and pulls her closer. “God, I was so sure that we’d never see you again.”

Emma can feel Killian watching her--watching them--and knows in her soul that Killian did not give up hope. Not for a single second.

He’s standing next to Tink, who is also watching with a small and satisfied smile. Killian wraps his arm around her until Tink’s head hits his shoulder and she says, “I told you I believed.”

“Aye,” he says, never turning away from Emma. “You did.”

He does that all night, he watches her but never hovers, never crowds, never gets too close; but it’s her mother that realizes when she needs to go.

“It’s too much for you, isn’t it?” Mary Margaret says.

Slowly, she nods. Emma can feel her entire body sag with relief at the admission.

“Yeah,” Mary Margaret says. “You know, I felt a little bit like that after the sleeping curse. I just--” she shrugs “--never had the luxury of a rest.” Her hand comes up to Emma’s cheek and she strokes it, pushing Emma’s hair out of her face. It’s easily the most motherly gesture Mary Margaret has ever indulged in and it feels good to let her do it. “You do. You should take Killian and go. Upstairs or to the _Jolly Roger_ or--”

“You dodn’t need me at home?” Emma’s not sure if she sounds hopeful or wistful. It’s probably both.

“Always,” Mary Margaret whispers. “But you deserve tonight. You deserve _everything_ , Emma. Besides, we both know that coming back to the loft won’t be--”

“It wouldn’t be the same,” Emma says, and her mother smiles, and they hug again, only separating when Emma can feel the brush of Killian’s hand on the small of her back. David’s standing behind Mary Margaret and reaches out to clap his hand on Killian’s shoulder as, with one last hug for Henry, they leave.

They walk back to the harbor hand-in-hand but with every step they’re drawing closer together until Emma curves herself into his side and rests her cheek in the hollow of his shoulder. 

\--

He tries to leave her, to let her sleep alone; she pushes him onto the bed and climbs on top of him. He’s still, and patient, and solid next to her even as she can feel him trembling.

Again.

He’s every bit as gentle when he removes the clothes as he was when he put them on her but Emma could swear she sees magic, sparks dancing where they touch, when his hand roams freely, when his lips follow; when he presses his face to the skin along her navel, breathing deeply.

“I dreamt about you, too,” she says. Her fingers are tracing the tattoo across his back, following the design from star to star. “Every night, I dreamt about you.”

There’s a breath of warmth at her belly button, ”I love you.” He says it so quietly that for a minute she thinks she imagined it, except for the way the words echo in her mind and across her soul. She holds him, tangling her fingers in the softness of his hair, as he moves lower, as he whispers again: “I love you.” And again it hums through her, over and over and over as he repeats the words like a benediction, worshipping her with his mouth and his hand and his body.

Emma Swan has forgotten a lot of things but she knows that she has never been touched like this, that she has never been loved _like this_ , and she knows that her mother was right.

“I love you,” she says.

Here, with Killian, is home.


	24. prompt twenty-six:  summer vacation

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> this is a conclusion to prompts two, four, six, ten, thirteen, sixteen and twenty-two.

It’s almost midnight on a Tuesday when there’s a knock at the door and Buttercup jumps.

So does Emma.

She’s been pacing around her apartment for hours--for days--leaving it even less often than usual, begging Mary Margaret or Ruby or David for groceries and she hasn’t told them why because she didn’t want to jinx it but now-- _now_ \--there’s a knock at the door.

At midnight.

And it’s _him_.

Oh, god, it’s _him_.

She flings the door open and all she can do is stare at him, dumbstruck. He’s equally still, a huge grin splitting his stupid-handsome face, his eyes wide and she can hear the way he inhales and then.

His voice. In person.

“Swan.”

That’s all he says.

She can’t even answer him.

Behind him, Westley barks and then _lunges_ , straight at her, his paws on her thighs and his head in her hands as he sniffles and snorts and his tail wags all over the place. Even though it’s most likely sheer joy at freedom from the car it’s hard not to take it as a sign and she laughs and Killian laughs and Buttercup hisses and swats and it sets them off again.

She still hasn’t let him in and he’s noticed, she can tell by the way his eyes are doing the thing where they twinkle as he laughs at her but keeps it all inside. So she--very maturely--sticks her tongue out at him and steps aside but not far enough aside that their shoulders don’t brush as he has to push his way past her.

His arm wraps around her waist before she can even process it.

Her arms are around his neck before she can even blink.

They’re inches apart.

She hasn’t seen another human in person in over a week, all for this moment and it’s just--it’s everything.

“Hi,” she says.

“Hi,” he says, before his arms tighten around her waist and she’s off the ground, lifted up against him like they hadn’t been close enough already. She giggles. God, she’s _giggling_.

He smells amazing. How does he smell amazing? He’s been driving for days, stopping barely long enough to sleep, camping along the way with a tent and kit he borrowed from Robin who is, apparently, mad about camping and drags them out on male-bonding trips at the drop of a hat.

“It’s summer vacation,” he’d said when she asked him about work. “Can’t argue with that, can you?” She could, though--she just didn’t want to.

“Emma, please,” he’d said. “Let me be the one who changes my plans for you. I’ll come back to Maine and we’ll go somewhere together. Just for a few days. Have a little fun. Learn how to be around each other again.”

Emma breathes in, deeply. His soap, it still smells the same, sharp and citrus with something herbal underneath.

“Woof.”

They pull themselves apart.

“I should--” he says.

“Yeah,” she says, pointing at the kitchen and the bowl she’d set aside for the dog. She waves her hand at the couch and the pile of sheets there. “I should--”

“Yeah,” he says, and winks. “I’d love to use the shower, if I may.”

Emma nods and does not picture him in the shower.

She doesn’t.

She makes up the couch. She busies herself in the kitchen, pulling out glasses and a bottle of rum.

(She does not picture him in the shower.)

The door to the bedroom opens and Emma can hear him laugh, so she turns. He’s walking out of the bedroom in a pair of sweatpants and a t-shirt, rubbing his hair with a towel and--

The dog is on the couch.

And her goddamn traitorous cat.

Westley is spread out, stretched from tip to toe with Buttercup curled into a ball against his belly, and maybe _this_ is what they call inevitable.

Killian scratches the back of his neck but his eyes are twinkling; Emma is deadly serious as she takes the towel from him and grabs his hand, interlocking their fingers as she leads them back into her room. Just as they cross the threshold, though, uncertainty grips her.

He squeezes her hand. “How about this,” he says, his voice gentle and understanding. “Clothes on, aye? Adults. That’s enough to deal with for one night.”

“Yeah?” she asks.

“I’m nervous, too,” he says, his eyes very blue and suddenly not twinkling at all. “Let’s just be here in the moment, together. Here and now. We have all the time in the world.”

She kisses him. Once, twice, chaste and on the corners of his mouth. Her heart is pounding so loudly she’s sure he can hear it as they lie down next to each other on the bed. There’s nothing but the blood rushing in her ears as _he_ kisses _her_ , softly. So softly. The tip of his tongue against her lips and nothing else; butterfly kisses along her cheekbones before he rests his forehead against hers. His hand is ghosting along the hem of her t-shirt, his thumb lightly stroking the skin there.

Emma closes her eyes and listens to his breathing.

Constant, rhythmic, soothing.

It’s everything.

\--

They drive to Acadia in the morning, the windows down, the radio quiet, just loud enough for Killian to sing along with after they’d woken up and walked the dog and Killian looked at her and said, “What do you say we set sail?”

Emma’s barefoot in the car and wrapped up in his hoodie like she’s a kid again except that now she knows how precious this feeling is. There’s coffee from Granny’s in the cupholder and his Thermos full of tea right next to it.

There’s Sand Beach, and Keats.

_O ye! who have your eyeballs vexed and_ _tired,  
_ _Feast them upon the wideness of the Sea;  
_ _O ye! whose ears are dinn’d with uproar rude,  
_ _Or fed too much with cloying melody, –_  
_Sit ye near some old cavern’s mouth, and brood  
_ _Until ye start, as if the sea-nymphs quired!_

He makes her grilled cheese on their campfire and they watch the flames while he plays with her hair, running his fingers through it. He’s in a beach chair and she’s on top of him, her back to his front, his other hand at her waist, rubbing small circles on her stomach. Westley’s next to her, in easy reach for when he wants to be petted.

“Killian,” she says. “Are you really going to stay?”

His voice hums in her ear. “This is our chance at a future, love. A happy ending. I damn well intend to take it. Will you?”

Emma nods. “Yes,” she says, and when she turns to kiss him, there’s nothing chaste about it.


	25. prompt twenty-seven:  dream

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> this is a companion to prompt eight.

She can’t say why, but there’s a part of her that recognizes him--the black hair, the short stubble, the _outfit_ , for fuck’s sake--and the blue of his eyes. The way his voice sounds when he says her name.

“Swan.”

The smile that lights him up as he says it is like something out of a dream, _her dreams_ , the dreams she’s been having off and on since the fire and their move to New York. The way he talks, the way he moves, the way he looks at her, the way he tastes and touches and flirts and cares.

She’s dreamt about kissing him.

She’s dreamt about doing a lot more than kissing him; imagined what it would feel like if his fingers--

The coolness of his rings along her--

His mouth, his tongue, his--

It takes Emma a minute to pull her wits together and all she can manage is “Whoa,” putting a hand out in front of herself as if she could possibly ward him off that way. 

She knows she can’t. Knows that he’ll push right up to the edge of her space and farther if she lets him and the strange thing is how much she wants to let him.

“Do I know you?” she asks, already knowing the answer.

“I need your help,” he says, not answering, speaking quickly. “Something’s happened. Something terrible. Your family--”

It’s the wrong thing to say and she can see him realize it, as though he’s steeling himself for something.

“My family is right here,” Emma says, hoping that the ‘fuck off’ is very strongly implied.

It is--she can see something flicker across his face, some mixture of frustration and amusement--but she’s somehow not surprised when he ignores it.

She’s not surprised when he _pushes_ , stepping into her apartment.

She’s not even surprised--not really--to feel his lips against hers. What surprises her is the way it feels.

Not just like a dream. Like a memory. Warmth rushing through her and buzzing at her fingertips, she half-expects to see silver-white magic--

Emma opens her eyes and before she can even think, she knees him in the groin. Comes back to her senses.

_Magic_? What the actual fuck?

Disappointment blooms across his face with the redness of his cheeks. “I had to try,” he says. “I was hoping you felt as I did.”

She almost says--she wants to say-- _Good_.

What she actually says is, “You’re going to feel my handcuffs when I call the cops,” and slams the door in his face.

It’s assault. He _assaulted_ her.

The thing is, she’s pretty sure that she’s done the same to him.

(And she knows, she _knows_ , that when she kisses Walsh at dinner tonight it’s going to feel like a disappointment.)

Whatever. It’s fine. One-time thing.

Only--she thinks about him more than she should for the rest of the day. Tries--fails--to get him out of her head and it’s like her brain is at war with itself.

That’s why she’s not completely surprised when--

“I can explain,” he says as he slides into the recently-vacated seat at her table. “I don’t do this very often, so treasure it, love. I’ve come to apologize.”

And--its’s weird--but there’s a part of her that wants to laugh, because he _never_ apologizes, and there’s something in his eyes that says he knows that she knows that and it makes her want to push back.

“You’re a crazy person,” she says, and his eyebrow goes straight in a gesture she’s sure she’s seen before, a spark lighting his eyes like he’s seen what he’s looking for.

“I prefer ‘dashing rapscallion’,” he says. She frowns and rolls her eyes. “‘Scoundrel’?”

“Give me one good reason not to punch you in the face,” she says, and feels a twinge in her knuckles; she is not prepared for his answer.

“Try using your superpower,” he urges, sitting back in his chair like he’s just won the battle.

And he has. She can see that he knows it, that he’s gotten to her.

Emma Swan needs answers to the things she can’t explain and she can feel it between them, something inexplicable.

“Just because you believe in something doesn’t make it real,” she protests.

“Maybe not,” he says. “But I know you, Swan.”

She’s lying.

He’s not.


	26. prompt twenty-eight:  fantasy

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> a bit of a coda to prompts eight and twenty-seven. a soulmate AU, of sorts. canon compliant for CS movie.

It’s not that she hasn’t had this fantasy--okay, maybe not exactly this fantasy, there was definitely no time travel involved, she absolutely had not planned on needing for fight for her actual existence--but the fairytale fantasy. She’d been a kid once. She’d seen all of the movies. She’d fantasized about being a princess.

And now she was one--in a castle, on a quest in the actual real-life Enchanted Forest. She’s the daughter of Snow White and Prince Charming and now she has the dress and everything.

The corset is digging into her waist, though. 

“Just when I thought the clothes here couldn’t get any worse,” she mutters.

So, she can’t breathe. It’s fine. The dress is red and her boobs look great and she can actually walk in her shoes which is an upgrade from her usual datewear and her headband sparkles and then Hook looks at her and says, “You might not be able to move, Swan, but you cut quite the figure in that dress.”

Emma blushes, because there he is, looking every inch the prince he is pretending to be, looking at _her_ and smiling like she is the answer to every fantasy he’s ever had, too. Her hand is wrapped around his arm and she can feel it, the inexplicable _thing_ that is never not between them.

There’s music ahead as King Midas sends them forward, music that sounds almost familiar but still like nothing she’s ever heard before. She’s curious, of course she is.

“Mary Margaret and David are always going on about this ball, and that ball,” she says. “What’s the big deal about these things?”

And then--oh. Wow.

The hall is enormous. The music fills the space just enough to be present but there’s still an air of joviality, of conversation, all around her. The tapestries are bright, colorful--everything is lit by torches and candelabra, and every jewel on every person in the room glitters in the dimness.

Hook’s just _looking_ at her, completely delighted, watching her take all of it in. She wants to say something, anything to take that smirk off of his face--his presence at these sorts of things probably always involves conspiracy to commit robbery, right?--but she can’t, because she’s too caught up watching the dancers.

His breath is warm and in her ear as he whispers, “You were saying?”

It’s easy--it’s too easy--to be here with him.

He’d followed her through a time portal. _He’d_ come after her, and there’s no one else she’d rather be here with.

She does care.

When she says, “What am I supposed to do?” she’s not only talking about the ring, but there’s her hand in his as he pulls her into the dance. 

His smirk and his eyebrow when he says, as if it should be obvious, “Blend in.”

She lets him lead her into the dance without even _questioning_ it. She’s not really surprised so much as she needs to fall back on their usual pattern when she needles him. “Wait. Are you saying you know how to do whatever this is?”

Because of course he does. Of course. There’s his hand at the base of her spine and his prosthetic held up for her with no hint of self-consciousness, just his smile--his _real_ smile and his blue eyes sparkling with anticipation--as he steps forward and they waltz.

And here’s the thing.

Here’s the thing.

She and Tinkerbell aren’t friends. It’s not like they had a lot of opportunities for bonding or whatever in their copious free time in between witch attacks. But Tink loves to chatter and tell stories and after the whole Robin-and-Regina thing happened Tink got caught up in a recitation of the different kinds of True Love she’d seen during her fairy days. 

“Watch the mocking,” Emma says. If it’s a little breathless, she can blame it on the dress. “I’m actually getting the hang of this.”

He’s not mocking her, but his smile, it’s just--

“I’m just thinking about what you said in Storybrooke, about not being a princess,” he says. 

Like the time she’d seen a couple who immediately and seamlessly knew all of the steps to a dance, pulling together and working through the steps as if they’d been doing it forever.

They just--started dancing. Together.

Like she and Hook are. 

The way he’s smiling at her, it’s taking her breath away and she _can’t_ , they can’t. 

Her first dance at her first royal ball and the reality is somehow so much better than the fantasy.

“I believe what I’m trying to say, Your Highness--” and he _bows_ , what even is her life? “--is that you appear to be a natural.”

Her father is there--the entire purpose of this ridiculous charade--but all Emma can do is stare at Hook. To look at him and really let herself _see_.

Let herself imagine, let herself believe.

Because the truth is, she doesn’t want to leave Storybrooke. She just doesn’t know how to let herself stay.

Emma watches him watch her and wonder if Hook’s ever heard any of Tink’s stories. 

Wonders what he believes.

But then, the doors fling open, and-- _oh, shit_.

Regina’s here.

Charming’s gone.


	27. prompt twenty-nine:  high school AU

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> inspired by _the princess diaries_ book series.

**September 9**  
Storybrooke Academy   
Fifth Period

Mom just texted.

Regina’s _here_.

Well, not here, exactly. But she’s in this country. She’s in _Storybrooke_.

Someone ought to warn the President she’s here. I mean it; he really ought to know. Because if anybody can start World War III, it’s _her_.

This is just too much. I am seriously considering running away from home.

Elsa’s like, “Your mom’s stepmom can’t be _that_ bad.”

Yeah, right. I just asked if she’s ever seen the movie _Snow White and the Seven Dwarves,_ “only imagine it way worse because it’s real life and she has opinions about things like my posture and my wardrobe and whether I styled my hair the right way.”

“Your hair is awesome, Em.”

I said it wasn’t according to Regina, who’d probably be a lot happier if I could braid my hair the way Elsa did, like all it needed to finish the look was a tiara.

Wait.

Do I have to wear a tiara?

The worst part was that Killian Jones overheard the whole thing. “Um,” he said. He looked kind of annoyed. “I don’t know if you two have noticed, but there’s kind of a class going on here?”

Elsa’s all, “Whatever, Killian, it’s study hall” but, like, why is he listening to our private conversation?

“Hard to keep it private when you’re talking out loud in a room full of people, Swan,” he said, and he did that stupid thing with his eyebrow that I _hate_ , where he only raises one of them. And his voice! What is that about, anyway? He’s from somewhere in Europe but he’s been living here a couple of years so his accent, like, fades in and out, especially when he says my name the way he does. _Swan_.

It’s Emma. Jerk. What is this, a _Harry Potter_ movie? CALL PEOPLE BY THEIR FIRST NAMES.

I went, “What is your problem?”

And he’s just like, “I’m not the one with a problem, it seems. You are. And the only reason that’s a problem, Swan, is because now I have to listen to you whinge about it.”

Then he did the weirdest thing. He _smiled_. “Bad luck, though. Seems like your grandmother’s a bit--?”

Psychotic. Definitely psychotic.

“I don’t know about that, Swan,” he said. “Anyway, I’m sure I’ll hear all about it in the next installment. Can’t wait.” And then he winked.

Kind of. His other eye kind of half closed and then the bell rang before I could answer him.

Elsa thinks he has a crush on me.

As if.


	28. prompt thirty:  joy

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> though this can be read as a standalone, it is a coda to [voices from the yellow road](https://archiveofourown.org/works/20543633).

**Mary Margaret [7:20 AM]  
** Ok but I’m worried

**Mary Margaret [7:20 AM]  
** Have you heard all of the weird noises coming from next door?

**David [7:22 AM]  
** Honestly babe I try not to listen to the noises coming from next door

**David [7:22 AM]  
** Just block them out of my mind whenever possible

**Mary Margaret [7:25 AM]  
** What? 

**Mary Margaret [7:25 AM]  
** No! 

**Mary Margaret [7:26 AM]  
** That’s not what I meant

**Mary Margaret [7:31 AM]  
** Also you like Killian

**David [7:34 AM]**   
Love him. More importantly, so does Emma

**David [7:35 AM]  
** Doesn’t mean I like knowing that much about what they get up to over there.

**Mary Margaret [8:01 AM]**   
They’d tell us, right? If something was going on?

**Mary Margaret [8:06 AM]  
** Right?

**David [8:07 AM]  
** Well…

**Mary Margaret [8:07 AM]  
** David Nolan if you remind me again about how bad I am at keeping secrets you are sleeping on the couch for a week

**David [8:09 AM]  
** Yes dear

\--

**Ruby [10:39 AM]**   
Stop, okay? She hasn’t told me anything.

**Ruby [10:39 AM]  
** Also they just moved in together. Let them bang it out in peace

**Ruby [10:43 AM]  
** Remember how bad you and David were?

**Mary Margaret [10:43 AM]**   
Whatever. 

**Ruby [10:44 AM]**   
Sweetie

**Ruby [10:45 AM]  
** We could hear it from the HALLWAY

\--

**Ruby [11:01 AM]**   
Red alert

**Emma [11:08 AM]  
** You know that’s still not funny right

**Ruby [11:09 AM]**   
Mary Margaret thinks something is up

**Emma [11:11 AM]**   
Ok

**Ruby [11:35 AM]  
** Not me though

**Emma [11:37 AM]**   
Right

**Ruby [11:37 AM]  
** Because I know you’re up to something

**Ruby [11:38 AM]  
** I can smell it

\--

**Mary Margaret [2:26 PM]  
** Is Killian still picking up Roland today?

**Robin [2:28 PM]  
** As usual, yes.

**Robin [2:28 PM]  
** Why do you ask?

**Mary Margaret [2:34 PM]  
** Roland keeps talking about ‘the babies’

**Mary Margaret [2:34 PM]  
** Maybe you should have a talk with him

**Robin [2:36 PM]  
** You think Killian Jones is giving my son lessons about the birds and the bees?

**Mary Margaret [2:37 PM]  
** God I hope not

**Mary Margaret [2:38 PM]  
** I mean…

**Robin [2:42 PM]**   
No

**Robin [2:42 PM]  
** I also hope not

**Robin [2:43 PM]  
** More than you, I’d wager

\--

**Robin [4:12 PM]  
** Heads up mate

**Robin [4:12 PM]  
** Mary Margaret is after me again

**Killian [4:15 PM]  
** What? 

**Killian [4:15 PM]  
** Why?

**Killian [4:16 PM]  
** I thought your date with Regina went well, you said

**Killian [4:16 PM]  
** Actually you said a lot more than that

**Killian [4:17 PM]  
** Used a lot more adjectives

**Killian [4:17 PM]  
** I just don’t care enough to remember them all

**Robin [4:19 PM]**   
Wanker

**Robin [4:23 PM]  
** What are you telling my son about sex

**Killian [4:24 PM]  
** Flattered though I am that Roland might consider me the expert out of the two of us

**Killian [4:24 PM]  
** Nothing

**Killian [4:25 PM]  
** Of course

**Killian [4:27 PM]  
** Kindergarten seems a bit young, yeah?

**Killian [4:28 PM]  
** I assumed first grade would be the appropriate age

**Killian [4:31 PM]  
** Really let him hone his skills.

**Robin [4:39 PM]  
** Mary Margaret reports that Roland spent the day in class talking about

**Robin [4:39 PM]  
** (And I’m quoting)

**Robin [4:40 PM]  
** ‘The babies’

**Killian [4:41 PM]  
** Oh

**Robin [4:42 PM]  
** Right.

**Robin [4:42 PM]  
** Oh.

\--

_Mary Margaret has entered the group chat_

**Killian [6:01 PM]**   
Robin has informed me that the lovely MM is hot on our trail

**Killian [6:01 PM]  
** So, Swan and I have a confession to make

**Ruby [6:02 PM]  
** Fucking finally

**Killian [6:03 PM]**   
We adopted kittens

**Mary Margaret [6:03 PM]  
** CONGRATULATIONS

**Mary Margaret [6:04 PM]  
** Wait

**Mary Margaret [6:04 PM]  
** What?

**Emma [6:05 PM]  
** Three of them

**Emma [6:05 PM]  
** We were just going to get the two but

**Emma [6:05 PM]  
** Old softie here couldn’t leave the third one behind

**Killian [6:06 PM]  
** She’s just a little runt, love.

**Killian [6:06 PM]  
** I wanted to give her a good home

**Ruby [6:07 PM]  
** Can you make googly eyes at each other in real life please and not pollute the chat

**Ruby [6:09 PM]  
** Also 

**Ruby [6:09 PM]  
** Did you name one after me at least

**Killian [6:10 PM]  
** Of course, Red

**David [6:11 PM]  
** Wait why didn’t you come to the shelter where I work

**David [6:11 PM]  
** I would have helped

**Emma [6:12 PM]  
** You’re seriously asking me that

**David [6:14 PM]  
** Right

**Mary Margaret [6:15 PM]  
** Come on

**Mary Margaret [6:15 PM]  
** It was one time!

**Robin [6:16 PM]  
** And Roland has, I take it, seen these kittens?

**Killian [6:19 PM]**   
Of course

**Killian [6:19 PM]  
** Promised him he could name one

**Ruby [6:20 PM]  
** How come he gets to

**Emma [6:20 PM]  
** Because he’s five

**Mary Margaret [6:23 PM]  
** So that’s it then

**Mary Margaret [6:23 PM]  
** That’s the secret

**Killian [6:23 PM]  
** What?

**Killian [6:24 PM]  
** Oh, no

**Killian [6:26 PM]  
** Emma’s pregnant

**Emma [6:26 PM]**   
I’m pregnant

**Ruby [6:27 PM]  
** YES

**Ruby [6:27 PM]  
** I knew it

**Emma [6:28 PM]**   
Can we do the googly eyes now then 

**Ruby [6:28 PM]  
** If you must <3 <3 <3 <3

**Robin [6:29 PM]  
** Congratulations, both of you

**David [6:30 PM]  
** I’m going to be an uncle??

**Mary Margaret [6:30]  
** So the noises I’ve been hearing?

**Emma [6:31 PM]**   
Ew, Mary Margaret

**Killian [6:31 PM]  
** Morning sickness

**Ruby [6:33 PM]**   
See, MM? Happy endings always start with hope

**Emma [6:34 PM]**   
You’re not naming my kid, either

**Ruby [6:34 PM]**   
Lame

  
  



	29. prompt thirty-one:  bedsharing

She can still feel the ghosts of his fingertips on her cheeks and the gentle way he approached her when he brushed away her tears. Somehow, after everything, she still hadn’t expected it--even though she knows better, has seen for herself that he is capable of thoughtfulness, of care, of tenderness. Even though Emma knows the value of walls as well as anyone, it still surprises her to see anyone drop them willingly. For her.

For someone to choose to make themselves vulnerable and genuine, for her.

It’s just at that moment Hook walks up, smiling--smirking--doing the thing with his eyebrows that’s as sure a sign as anything that he’s--

“Good morning, Swan. Beautiful day, isn’t it?”

Emma blushes, even though it is, in fact, a beautiful day.

“You know this isn’t a vacation, right?” Emma says. “What’s with the good mood?”

“I slept well last night,” he says. “Didn’t you? You certainly looked--” he does the eyebrow thing again “--comfortable.”

“I’ll leave a review on Yelp as soon as we get home,” she says, purely to wipe the smirk off of his face. He rolls his eyes but doesn’t lose the grin, turning away and walking toward David.

Emma’s watching Snow and Red but listening to David and Hook.

“Well, we did it,” David says.

“Aye, we did.”

“I hope your night wasn’t too difficult. I imagine Princess Leia isn’t much accustomed to camping rough.”

“You’d be surprised by exactly what she’s capable of, mate,” Hook says, and Emma can hear the pride in his voice.

Which also surprises her.

“But worry not,” Killian says. “I gave her my coat and let her sleep. Kept watch. After the past few days, the quiet was not unwelcome.”

Snow and Red exchange one last hug before Red grabs her basket to leave, and then Snow catches Emma’s eye.

It’s awkward.

They didn’t speak much over the fire the night before, waiting for it to die down as everyone readied themselves for sleep. There just wasn’t anything to say. Snow gives her a small, tight smile--exactly the kind Emma always gives Mary Margaret--and gestures at the two men.

“You and Charles, you make a good team, you know?” Snow says. It’s almost like she’s talking to herself. “Must be nice to have a happy ending.”

“Don’t you like happy endings?” Emma asks before she can stop herself.

“Oh, sure,” Snow says. “I’m just not sure I believe in them.” She shrugs and gives a half-hearted wave. “I’m going to be on my way, then. Thank you again.”

Emma’s left staring after her, a strange ache in her chest and in the pit of her stomach, as Snow walks toward David and Killian comes back, sitting next to her--but not too close--on the log she’s chosen for its view of the camp.

And of her cellmate.

She’s got other things to worry about at the moment.

\--

“So,” Emma says, “you know the rest.”

“Wow!” Henry is enthralled. “That actually sounds kind of fun, you know--camping in the Enchanted Forest with a big bonfire. Sleeping under the stars.”

“Eh,” Emma says, _not_ looking at Hook. “We didn’t really sleep after that. Too worried about what might be coming after us in the woods. Hook and I ended up keeping watch all night, you know?”

Out of the corner of her eye Emma can see Hook watching her, sipping his beer while he half-listens to Granny. She turns back to her parents just as her mother points at the picture in the storybook. “Wait,” she says. “You’re Princess Leia?”

Henry snorts. “Nice alias.”

Emma can’t see Hook anymore, though.

And then--

“People of Storybrooke, it’s our great joy to introduce you to our our son, Prince Neal.”

It’s strange how, in that moment, the only person she wants to see is the one she can’t.

So she goes looking for him.

And when he says, “It was the right thing to do,” she can feel his fingertips again in her memory and decides that she wants to feel them in reality.

 _He traded his ship for her_.

She definitely hadn’t expected that, and it’s--god, his fingers are just so much better when they’re against her cheeks while he’s kissing her--or while she’s kissing him--either way she could lean into his touch forever and never get tired of it, except for the fact that Emma also needs to breathe.

So does he, and he’s breathing as heavily as she is when they finally pull apart.

He’s doing the smirking thing again, though. And the eyebrow.

“What?” Emma says, smiling.

“Nothing,” Killian says. “I’m merely curious as to why you chose to lie to your boy about our sleeping arrangements.”

“You lied to my father first,” she says.

It’s his turn to blush.

“Hey, you want to hear my review?” Emma says. “Warm, safe, comfortable and cared for. Would _absolutely_ stay here again.” She leans forward until their lips are nearly touching.

“I think we can make that happen, love,” he says, closing the distance between them.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> well, that's all, folks!  
> reminder that prompt fourteen is published separately as ["from the edge of the deep green sea."](https://archiveofourown.org/works/25850881)
> 
> [prompt twenty-three (poison)](https://ohmightydevviepuu.tumblr.com/post/627290735699492864/writers-month-prompts) is an excerpt from a longer WIP and is only on tumblr at the moment.
> 
> thank you so much for following along with me. thank you for your kudos and your comments and your conversations. thanks for helping me get through august.


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